Twin's Side
by FrozenMiwa
Summary: Just when you think it's all over, that you won't have to run anymore from whatever it is happened in the past, guess what's come back to haunting you! When Raphael helps a damsel in distress - who just happens to look identical to Karai and is chased by foot bots there must be troubles a head!
1. Prologue - Buried in the snow

**A/N:** So this is my first and yet only TMNT fanfiction, I know the plot is kind of lame, but it's been stuck in my head for months now, I couldn't get rid of it so I had to write it.

Prologue: Buried in the snow

It was many years ago, or at least a couple years, but it feels like a life time. At least it did for the foolish little girl. Well what else can you expect from little girl? She doesn't even remember that night very well. She remembered the cold, for it was freezing cold that night. She couldn't see what was happening around her, it was way too dark for that. Only thing she could see was the snow, glowing blue in the dark. She heard noting, not even her own breathing; it was silent night, freezing and silent night. Though she was only a child, she knew that this was it; no one was going to find her. She was going to die, and as she closed her eyes, she hoped it to be the last time, that she would fall for an eternal sleep. Never to woke up.

But it was a coincidence which saved her. A hunter named Mathias Blomgren a Scandinavian hunter, who had settled down in Finland after serving in the army for many years after the loss of his beloved wife. For he had come to that damn country to hunt with his dogs, he wanted to see if the newest one had any gifts for bear hunting as he was Karelian bear dog. But as for the young dog, he didn't fancy the sound of rifle, which scared him. He had known that his master was disappointed. But in that night, he did find something buried in the snow, or should I say somebody. As my dad told me, other dogs didn't smell a thing, but young Thorin did. As he started barking, at first his master ignored him. But Thorin did not give up, as he known that someone was in need of his help. And for that someone would become his best friend.

"Very well, you mut." The hunter said. "What is it this time?"  
Thorin led his master toward the place he had smelled a peculiar smell, he smelled a human, he smelled blood and he smelled something else, but Thorin did not know what that was. As he found the place that smell was coming, he went straight to the pile of snow, for it was snowing that night. And it had been for several hours. He knew there was something in the pile of snow, someone who shouldn't be there. He started to dig with his black paws, very carefully, since he didn't want to harm the one he wanted to save. He barked for his master to come and help him. As his master walked closer, he noticed the human hand peeping from the snow. He ran to his dog quickly, for now he had understood. It was a child, with pale skin and short dark brown hair. For a moment he thought that the child had frozen to dead. But then he saw how the girl weakly raised her hand and touched gently the dog's face.  
"Inu." She whispered with a fragile voice as Thorin replied whining anxiety for small human puppy. The hunter took the girl in his arms; he noticed several scars, bloody scars on her in her arms. He put his hunting coat to cover up the frozen body of the little one as he and his dogs headed for the hunter's cabin.

The girl woke up few hours later, finding another dog, Finnish Spitz laying down beside her, trying to warm her.  
"Inu." The girl said with a weak voice. As the she-dog noticed her being awake, she started to lick her face as if she was her own puppy. The girl was afraid of the hunter at first, they didn't understand each other's at first, until the hunter realized that the girl was talking Japanese, he knew a little of that language, luckily.  
"What is your name?" He asked.  
The girl simply shook her head.  
"What happened to you?" He asked, but the answer remained the same. As for the scars she had it was no wonder that she had forgotten. Someone did hurt her, maybe it was a parent or guardian or just accident, but she was traumatized. Thorin was thrilled to find the little girl awake, he barked, as he was enjoying himself and he wanted to play with her for he was still a puppy himself, but the she-dog drove him away from her new baby. As the days passed the girl with no name started to talk even more with an elderly hunter.  
"Who is that?" She asked when she noticed the old photography by the chimney place. There was a beautiful woman with a golden hair and bright blue huge eyes smiling at the camera.  
"That is my wife. She's dead now." The hunter said.  
"I've lost my mother." The girl said. It was the one and only thing she had ever said about her past. As another week went by, nameless received a pair of new winter boots and winter wardrobe from the hunter, so she could play with a she-dog and Thorin but only by the cabin. She found the happiness she had never truly had. During the nights she felt sad and cried a lot, Thorin let her hug him for he wanted her to start feeling home with them. As Thorin would've known that she would be a part of their family soon enough. The hunter called her just "girl". But then came the time he had to return to home, to Finland. The girl was afraid of being left alone.  
"Listen, shorty." He said to that night while sitting on her bed. "Tomorrow we're going home."  
"We are?" She asked.  
"Thorin would protest leaving you here." The hunter said, smiling gently for the first time. "But now you have to have a name."  
"A name?" Girl replied. The hunter gazed upon the old photography of her late wife.  
"Marie. Marie Wilhelmina Blomgren. That'll be your name."

In future years the girl felt happy, as she was a part of real family, not controlled by the fear. She thought that all the pain, fear and darkness could not reach or find her anymore. But she was a stupid child, very stupid.  
How do I know of this? Because that girl is me. And I was fool, I know that by now. I can't run from my past, I can't run from this. Or from you, sister.


	2. Chapter 0 - The Rainy Beggining

**A/N:** If you aren't interested at reading some "This is what happened before anything important actually was going on" - This is something I just wanted to do, it's about Marie's first night/nights in New York after moving in. This is not important part of the story, so you can just skip it if you want to.

I think this chapter went well, sure it is a boring one and the ensing makes my OC Marie - a main character seem like stupid brainless girl, I just can't write right, I know. ._. I hope Marie doesn't seem Mary-Sueish and if she does, just tell me and I try to do my best to fix it.

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Chapter 0 – Dreams fulfilled?

I was quite nervous in that morning. Firstly I didn't fancy flying, soon after the plane raised up, I started to feel sick, but it wasn't because I felt bad, it was the guy next to me started to vomit over and over again, and when I finally thought he was pass that, he started to vomit some more. As I sat by him, I started to feel sick, who wouldn't?  
"I think I'm going to die on this." He said.  
"No, you aren't. You have been puking your system out, so soon there's nothing left on your stomach to come out, my friend." I said as I tried to focus on reading.  
"And that should cheer me up?" Boy asked sarcastically. "How's the Barry Porter?"  
You see, that's how you know he is really sick. My friend here, he dislikes these novels, it's just because some jerks at our former school used to call him Barry Porter – he was the main protagonist of this book, it was just because my friend, Gargie – yeah, weird name but back to the point, he was scrawny, he had messy black hair and light green eyes, mint green eyes as I liked to call them.  
"Where are you going to live now?" I asked him, trying change the subject, maybe it would take his sickness away, temporarily at least.  
"To my dad's." He said.  
"I thought you hated the stepmother." I said.  
"I don't like her, but she beats my mom." Gargie sighed. And I knew why, Mrs. Eek wasn't the nicest person around, or easiest, I had known Gargie since I was 14-years old, by the time his parents were going to divorce for good, and I can see why, nothing was ever good enough for her, not her husband's job, not a nerdy son, who had a girl for best friend, she consider it wrong, as for guys best friends should be other guys, girls would only be for dating, disgusting, huh? We weren't a couple, though many believed it to be true, and if we were, she still would be against it, since his son deserved much better than some Asian street orphan – as she called me. I think she's some-what racist too.

"How about you, Marie?" Gargie asked.  
"Dad got us some house to live in." I told him.  
"Where is he by the way?" Gargie asked.  
"He is already in New York." I said. "He'll be in the airport."  
"But if he is already there, why are the dogs here?" Gargie asked. I put my book on the side and sighed.  
"Are you worried about Thorin?" He asked.  
"Thorin? No." I replied. "He is fine, since he has been on the plane several times; same goes for Storm but Roy. What if he escapes?"  
"Like in that movie Blom made us watch in Biology class before the graduation?" Gargie asked. "You think Roy is going to escape from the transport cage like in the movie?"  
"I don't know." I sighed. "I don't even know how it's going to work, with three dogs, who are used to running free in the forest, and with the big city and with the school."  
"Come on, Marie." Gargie said as he put his hand on my shoulder. "It will work out fine, I know it will. And besides, both of us were raised on this small Finnish town, and now we are attending some elite school in New York. I get a hell away from my mom; you get to see the world as you've always wanted. Trust me, it's going to be a dream come true."  
"I guess you're right." I said tiredly. "What could go wrong?"  
Yes, what _could_ go wrong? Everything was perfect, for a teenager girl getting to New York for study it was a dream come true, studying wasn't my dream, but seeing the world was. But little did I know for what was waiting for me in the city of dreams – as Gargie called it. I fell asleep at some point, during the flight, as far as I noticed Gargie didn't throw up after our little conversation, and believe me, if he had, I would have woken up by it. He woke me up when the plane was about to land.  
I yawned, as Gargie started to talk about how awesome it was to be in America. I didn't listen much. As I stepped out of the plane, I noticed that the weather wasn't any good. The sky was all grey and it was raining. Wow, this I've never seen in TV, when it was about this city anyway.

The airport was crowded with many people, with colorful or simply just black umbrellas. I look for my dad, but I didn't find him. Gargie found his stepmother.  
"There comes Hogatha!" Gargie said bitterly as the woman with dark red hair approached us with a tall man in his 50's with same jet black hair and mint green eyes as my best friend. He was doctor Granberg, whom as I could see had lost some weight after the time I last saw him. He looked better, happier, he smiled at us while holding yellow umbrella.  
"Dad." Gargie said, but didn't sound too happy.  
"Valdemar." Doctor Granberg answered.  
"Don't call me that." Gargie said and glared at his father. "Only a fool would name his only son 'Valdemar'."  
Little giggle came out of my mouth, what can I say? His expression and voice sounded funny when he was called by his real name.  
"How was the flight?" The red haired woman asked, kindly.  
"Part horrible." Gargie said, yet again, bitterly.  
"Did you feel sick again?" Doctor Granberg asked, there was concern in his eyes, I guess every other father would be worried about his son's wellbeing.  
"What if I did?" He asked bitterly. I knew that Gargie hated his father – partly at least, for leaving his home country and marrying some broad when the divorce between him and his wife wasn't completely done, I found it sicken, that sounded something that would happen only in some stupid soap opera, didn't it?  
"Gargie." I said and put my hand on his shoulder, hoping it would calm him down.  
"And you must be Marie." The red haired woman said and turned her dark green eyes and smiled kindly. "Valdemar often speaks of you."  
"He does?" I asked, it was stupid thing to ask, but I never believed he would talk about his friends to his stepmother whom he hated. I turned my eyes on him and looked back at him, but he didn't do the same.  
"Only way to survive the bitch."  
His father was about to say something, but didn't manage, for someone shouted in the crowd: "Dog in the loose!"  
This started a panic, of some kind, which I can understand pretty well, I'm a dog person, but I don't find unknown dog sniffing or jumping on me very nice. Everyone sort of panicked, someone shouted:  
"Careful! It may bite you!" But it didn't. Soon enough white long furred German shepherd ran through the crowd – and what else – jumped on me. His paws were all muddy, but at least he seemed to be fine, as he started to lick my face.  
"I love you too Roy." I growled, because let's face it: being fallen down by a dog into the wet ground wasn't exactly in my top ten lists. As I pushed him off of me two other dogs, beautiful Finnish Spitz with russet fur and quite large Karelian bear dog with as usual black and white fur.  
"I told you so." I said to Gargie.  
"Looks like they really DID run away." The boy commented.

"Didn't I tell you to lock the cage properly?" The harsh voice that belonged to a man asked. As I turned my head (and Roy started to lick my cheek) and saw the elderly man standing there, with a worn hunting jacket and greyish hair, no smile came to his lips.  
"Hey, dad." I said. "Get off of me, Roy you silly dog." As I pushed the dog off of me, Gargie pulled me up.  
"You ok?" He asked.  
"Pretty much, little wet though." I said.  
"How beautiful dogs." The red haired woman said and approached Thorin, who growled at her.  
"Sorry, he doesn't fancy strangers." I said.  
"Come on then, I don't fancy getting wet here." Dad said.  
"But my stuff." I reminded him.  
"Put them on the car already." Dad said. "Come on."  
"Well, it was nice to meeting you, Mrs. Granberg." I said as I followed my dad. "See you at school, Gargie."  
"That's sound exiting." Gargie said sarcastically.  
"It really does!" I said. For once, I was exited of going into the school. I never liked the school in Finland, but maybe, just maybe this time it would work out better.

Dad had found us a nice house, not too close to the heart of New York, since he didn't like crowded or noisy places or the company anyway. My room was nice, not too big or too small, just the way I liked it. Dad had put my school on my bed, to make sure I noticed it. I was really looking forward of using it, since they never used school uniforms in Finland – and because of that more popular – as the term was tended to bully other for wearing the "wrong kind" of clothes, pretty stupid, but that was just the way it was.

I didn't sleep well at night. I was worried about the next day at new school; I never slept well in foreign places. Though Storm – the Finnish Spitz was sleeping right beside me as she had done for years, I still couldn't sleep. The morning came and I was tired. Storm woke me up as usual: liking my face. I dressed up in my school uniform, it was kind of nice looking actually, it consisted of a black long sleeved shirt, maroon vest, dark red necktie with dark grey stripes and a dark grey quite short skirt with black plaid pattern and a maroon stripe on the hem. Sure, I could go to the school with this; I have to admit that I did add little something. I put dark grey tights on, just in case. There could be cold outside. My hair was as usual, a mess. I managed to tame them a little bit and tie them with braids.

As for the school, it was a huge building at the center of Manhattan painted with yellow. There were many people outside; I noticed that many of the girls had covered their faces with a thick layer of make-up. As I went inside, there were some other girls, covered with make-up, as I stepped inside they stared at me for a second and then started talking, as I didn't even exist. Fine, I didn't find talking to the strangers being very nice. It was very annoying. I looked for Gargie, but of course he wasn't there. I just hoped he wouldn't be late as he tended to be. Then I started to look around, the entry was very large and had some size on it, there was the coat rack and mirror, the canteen was also nearby, it seemed very large as I looked it, I didn't even see it fully. Then the moment I had feared came. Some elderly woman told us to come into the corridor next to the stairs. She put us standing in a row, which I hated. I had been doing this before, when I entered the middle school. And then, there was a bunch of teachers, mostly woman, some looked really strict, and few men, who looked just ordinary. Every teacher would stand in front of the bunch of student, present herself and tell what class she'll be in charge for and who should be in the class. It took long time, until it was just me and a bunch of boys – but no Gargie – left. In front of us stood the only male teacher, who had a large belly and bit longer light brown hair.  
"Name is Thorsten Eek; I'm being in charge of the class 13." Oh, great. What an unlucky class we're going to be. And then it started. I could feel my legs starting tremble and my belly starting to move around with my breakfast.  
"Blomgren." He called, and I had no other chance that step forward.  
"Carlsen." From behind me, stepped a tiny boy with straw yellow hair, he looked down on his shoes.  
"Granberg."  
"Here!" Gargie shouted on the door and run to the corridor. "Sorry I'm late."  
"No problem." The teacher said. "Frisk." A tall boy with blonde hair and a cap stood forward and yawned.  
"Holt." Another boy who had a blonde hair stepped forward, he looked almost exactly like the previous one but had green eyes instead of blue.  
"Olsen." Another tiny guy stepped forward; he had light brown messy hair. Until there was only one guy left, and I knew who he was, Johannes Ström from the same middle school as me and Gargie. He was a large muscular guy with light brown hair and blue eyes.  
It seemed that I was the only girl in the class. Well, at least there couldn't be same problems as with my former class.  
"This school is full of pretty girls, and this is what we get?" Said the blonde with baseball cap.  
"Well excuse me." I mumbled. Seriously? If my face was that horrible to look at, no one was forcing him to look.  
"Marie!" Gargie shouted, almost anyway and put his trembling arm around my neck. "This is horrible! Look what I'm wearing! This is a murder!"  
"Didn't you know about the school uniforms?" I asked.  
"Nope!" He said with high-pitched voice. "I wake up and Hogatha comes in my room and tells me to wear this clown costume!"  
I looked at him, his outfit was exactly like mine, without a skirt of course, he had dark grey jeans with black plaid pattern instead.

"Come on." Said the teacher. "Let's get to the class."  
"Do we have to?" Asked the baseball cap guy.  
"No, we can stay here the whole day." I said to him sarcastically.  
"Was that sarcasm?" He asked.  
"Don't know." Gargie said. "Was it, Marie?"  
"Who knows?" I sighed. We followed the teacher as he went up the stairs one time and then up to the second stairs. All the doors were painted dark grey and there was a code in every door, such as "314" or something. Our home room was in class 317. It was a regular class with lots of tables and computers. Yeah, I know, it doesn't sound like your everyday classroom, but yet again, this wasn't your typical high school. I decided to sat in the first table, Gargie sat right behind me and right next to me, sat the baseball cap dude.  
"Listen up everybody." The teacher said, as he walked back of the room, as I looked back, I noticed that there wear a teacher's table. That was strange, I had never seen a teacher sitting behind the students.  
"You know why you are here." Teacher said. "Or do you?"  
"No." Said the baseball cap dude.  
"You should already know that the school you're in is an elite school, where only few are accepted in."  
"And how did we get here?" The baseball cap dude asked, few guys laughed at the back.  
Teacher ignored him and continued his speech. "This isn't a normal high school."  
"Aww." Some sighed behind me.  
"In here, you sort of study yourself a job – that would be the easiest way to describe it. And you lady and gentlemen, have chosen a fine art of fixing computers." I know what you're thinking; the main character must be some weird geek. Well what can I say; this is what I'm good at. And besides if my plan A wouldn't work out, this would be what I were to do as I graduated here.

The day wasn't that bad, our homeroom teacher seemed like a nice, no too strict guy. But my day didn't end as the school was over, not at all. As I went home to get my outfit – for ballet, it wasn't any fancy tutu, what would you see in the finest ballets, it consisted of this white leotard and worn ballet slippers which used to be white, like my pointe shoes, I needed to get the new ones someday soon, before I would break these while dancing. I took Storm for a walk; I would leave her with Gargie as I would go to my very first ballet lesson in New York. Gargie was kind of pleased to see me and Storm.  
"There is too much romance at home, it's yucky!" He said.  
"Why wouldn't you take Storm home with you?" I asked. "Just return her to me when I'm done with the lesson."  
"What do you say, Storm?" Gargie asked from the dog. "Wanna go see the witch?"  
I sighed. I didn't think she could be that bad, Gargie just was mad at his father, though he wouldn't admit it, for choosing the red haired over his son, but at least his father was trying to make it right. As I gave Storm to him, I noticed how my feet turned like an over cooked pasta, we were standing in front of the ballet studio and I could feel bunch of butterflies flying inside my belly, like always when I was going for something unknown, like the new ballet company. Sure I had danced ever since I was nine years old, but I still didn't feel any self-confidence at the moment. As Gargie was gone, I noticed that I didn't have to go in by myself. At the door there was standing a woman, probably at her late 40's, with pale and sharp featured face, her hair was as grey as iron and her eyes were dark brown, so dark that they looked like black, but they were still very observant.  
"Mademoiselle Blomgren, I presume?" She said, there was a French accent in her voice.  
"Yes." I said. "Are you.."  
"Madame Perrault." She presented herself. "I'm in the charge of the ballet company where you're about to join. You may call me Madame as the other dancers do."  
"Yes." I said, but quickly I added. "Madame." as I didn't want to present myself as rude person.  
"Follow me." She said. "I'll show you around." I followed her inside. As we passed the entry, she started talking.  
"I wouldn't consider of taking new ballerinas unless this wouldn't be the request made by Mrs. Inoue."  
"I understand." I replied.  
"So consider yourself lucky, she does not praise anybody without a reason. As I understood this would be worth it."  
I knew it already, I simply nodded, though I wanted to add that it was still miss Inoue, she had not married anyone and as she said she never will.  
"Do not expect me to pay you any favors just because she taught you."  
"I do not. That's not why I am here. If you talked with her you should know it by now." I replied. Did this lady really think I got here just because of my sensei? Did she think I wasn't hard working enough? Could this be that kind of school where you got in when your parents paid for it?  
"She mentioned you have some temper. But weren't it for that scandal..."  
"She mentioned it." I replied.  
"We wouldn't need another dancer, you understand?"  
"Yes, Madame." I said.  
"Any of my girls does not use drugs, you understand?"  
She was only playing though with me, but luckily she didn't scare me. And why did she have to use: understand-phrase all the time? I wasn't that stupid looking was I?  
"Madame, with all due respect, I have never touched drugs, but I have read what they do for the dancer that uses them. I want you to know, that I want to be good, really good, and that's why I don't get these people who do drugs while being on the top."  
I shut my mouth, as she looked me strictly to my eyes, as she was trying to see, if I was lying or not.  
"Well at least we're on the same line mademoiselle Blomgren." She finally said. As she showed me the hall where we would do our dancing she led me straight to the dressing room. Even from the door I could here there was a gossiping session going on. However when Madame stepped in everybody stopped talking.  
"This is Marie Blomgren, from Finland." She said with a strict voice. "She'll be covering Jessica's place."  
"But what about when Jessica comes back from the detoxification?" Asked the girl at the center of all other dancers, as she was their queen.  
"She won't be coming back to this company, mademoiselle King." Madame said strictly. "Now, hurry up. Meet me in the hall in ten minutes."

As she went off, I managed to find myself a lonely place, since every other dancer was going on with the gossip again, but soon did I notice, that the gossip – or talking, whatever they called it – was about me.  
"Did she say Finnish?" Someone whispered. "She looks like Asian to me."  
"Maybe she's half-Asian." Someone said behind me.  
"Or some poor street orphan from China." Said the girl who spoke earlier, the queen bee. "You know, they throw baby girls in the river sometimes."  
Alright, I hated these girls. Was that all they had in mind? Really?  
As I started to dress up in my leotard some girls started to sigh like they would over react to something, then the whispering started again. And I knew what it was about this time.  
"Where did she get those?"  
"Did you see the ones she has on her back?"  
"Where did she get them? Especially that big one..."  
"You do realize I can hear you?" I said sarcastically.  
"So what?" The queen bee said as she was putting her dark brown hair in the bun.  
"Why won't you speak a loud, or don't you have guts for that?" I asked and faced with the amber eyed so called queen. I put my hair up in the messy bun and walked out of the dressing room with my worn ballet shoes.

The lesson went pretty well, if I don't count that fail or should say fall in the end of the lesson. We were supposed to show our pirouettes to Madame. When it was my turn, I managed to spin around just one time, and then I stumbled and fall on my knees.  
"Very well, you need more practice." She said to me as I returned to the line, the amber eyed devil smirked at me nasty. I don't care about what she thought, I don't. As I watched her doing the move perfectly, I got to admit, I envied her little bit. But I just have to make this right. I'll learn, I must learn. Of course, this was all they talked about in the dressing room.  
"Jessica was so much better than her." Someone said.  
"I know, right?"  
I sighed. I hate you guys, or actually I already knew that. But I'm not going to be best friends with any of you, so that's ok. Soon you have no reason to laugh at me, I promised to myself. As I changed back to my school uniform – yes, I still wore it and quickly opened my hair. I didn't even bother to making braids; I just let it be as it was. I didn't want to spend any more time with these bitches that I had to.

Luckily Gargie was already outside with Storm, who barked thrilled as she saw me coming, I hurried to them and stroked her fur.  
"Who's my good girl?" I asked gently.  
"The witch liked her." Gargie said. "Can I bring Thorin next time?" And he grinned, he knew as well as I did, that Thorin wouldn't let him to walk him, he was way too stubborn. But he wouldn't like Gargie's stepmother for sure, for he hated strangers.  
"Well, I need to get going." I said as I took the leash from Gargie. "See you tomorrow."  
I didn't want to be around anybody right now. What do I need to say? I was disappointed in myself. I should be able to do that move without failing and still I didn't. As we came across the dark alley I told Storm:  
"Let's go this way, it's a short cut." I didn't know if it was, I just needed walk around to calm myself down and let the failure wash away. As we walked in the alley, there was no one around – or so I thought. Near the trash cans there was someone – or something sitting in front of them. I didn't see what it was exactly but it was huge and.. spiky? I was pretty sure it wasn't all human. It growled at me, wanting me to get away, and believe me I was going to, but then this stupid feeling rose. Can you guess what it was? It was the feeling which killed many innocent and stupid school girls – like me, in the horror movies. Yes, it was curiosity. I approached the thing slowly, as dad had taught me to do, if I ever came a cross angry dog. Storm did that too, she wasn't afraid, she just squeaked carefully. It was dead silence, no one did say anything. What I should've said? "Don't be afraid, I won't hurt you."? That sounded stupid and lame. I knew I should've been scared, but as I could see the creature whatever it was, was bleeding, it was hurt and probably, yes just probably it wouldn't attack me. I blinked my eyes and watched it, and it watched back.  
As it would've asked: aren't you scared?  
Of course I'm scared of many things, but now, I wasn't – but just because I was a fool who should've known to run away in situations like this but wouldn't.


	3. Chapter 1 - Mad man in reptile costume

**A/N:** Yay, the first chapter! I really liked writing this one - I got lot of help from ArizunoShojo, thank you very much!  
I think this chapter came out pretty nicely though I suck at writing fighting scenes. If you have hints how I could do better writing them or any ideas for the story itself, I would like to hear. And do warn me if Marie seems to be becoming a Mary-Sue.

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Chapter 1 - Mad man in reptile costume

Let's get this straight; when I first moved into this city, no one didn't mention anything, about being hunted by a creepy robot or being stalked by some crazy, human sized turtle. I know what that sounds like, it's crazy, but then again, this whole night is crazy. As I ran down the street with Thorin, watching my back every now and then, good news: the robot is gone, for now at least, but I had this feeling, I was pretty sure that the other one was somewhere nearby. Thorin was restless, he sensed it too.  
"Don't worry, it'll be alright." I said. But it was pretending, nothing more. We weren't safe, but what could I do? Go home? There was no one to help me, dad was in his stupid hunting trip and as for the neighbors, and I didn't feel like running to them either. If I told them some crazy big turtle armed with whatever it was, pointy thing anyway, was after me, they would honestly think me as some lunatic. I was tired, once again I couldn't get enough sleep, and ballet lessons were getting harder and with the regular school, and now with the running...

In the end I found myself in the same place, I often went. It was my secret, it was near the small river, I like sitting by the water, and it usually calmed me down. As I sat down and removed my pointe shoes, my feet hurt – those shoes were not meant for running. I sank my aching feet in the water, it seemed to cool them down, and for the moment it felt like the best feeling ever. I know what you are thinking. Since when did New York become the home of all this madness? I let you know that I've only lived here for two months, so I honestly don't know. All I was meant to do was make it out from my ballet lessons alive, meet up with my friends and then go home. But plans changed, it's kind of long story actually.

It all began in this very boring place, I'm quite of sure that you all have been there. It was called school. Don't get me wrong, I usually liked the school kind of, but today I was really tired, and Nils – the guy who sat beside me, annoyed me. He was very loud pretty much always, but especially when he was playing some stupid game online, which he did quite often. He rarely did any studying, he only played with his gang, Danish Casper and Norwegian Emil, they would come to the classes when they pleased, but they didn't let others to study peacefully, they were always shouting each other's, and our homeroom teacher, didn't mind, though he sometimes glared at them. I may sound like some geek with no life, but when you needed to consecrate, someone shouting right beside your left ear didn't help out.  
"God dammit!" I shouted, when Nils was going to praise his awesome gaming skills.  
"What is it, Ma-Ma?" The blonde haired guy asked. He had called me that ever since the first school day.  
"I'm so not your mama." I said to him annoyed.  
"Sounds like someone does miss his mama." The voice behind my back said jokingly and made the whole glass laugh silently. I turned my head and smiled to the black haired boy, he smirked back.  
"I so do not." Nils said loudly. "She's annoying, always hugging and kissing me, like I was some little brat."  
"Be grateful that you still have a mom." Said a tiny boy from the next row. Some of us had never even met our mothers. I turned my face back to the computer screen, only to growl with frustration.  
"Do me a favor Nils, and tell me what does that mean."  
"What does?" Nils asked and for once he took his eyes of his own screen and looked into the other screen. "Oh those. It's Swedish."  
"I know!" I almost shouted at him. "But what do they mean?"  
"Who knows?" The boy asked as he turned back to his game.  
"Would it be impossible for you to help me even this once?" I asked him.  
"Can't. Need to finish this level." He said without even looking at me. Nils, I dislike you, I said to myself. And I really did, he hadn't done anything but gotten in my nerves from the beginning. Well I'm glad I wasn't supposed to get along with everybody in this god dammed class. I head steps behind me, as I turned my face around, I saw Oliver, with his messy – today it was really messy thigh, hair.  
"Um, my mom was Swedish-Finnish; I could try to help you out." He said while looking down on his shoes. "I know little Swedish, but maybe it helps."  
"At least you're willing to help." I smiled at him before I glared at Nils. "Unlike some."  
Well, it turned out Oliver did know Swedish some-what better than I, and we managed to turn the operation system back to English.  
"Um, I was wondering." Oliver said awkwardly.  
"What?" I asked.  
"Would you guys like to come over today?" He meant me and Gargie of course. "My uncle is sort of curious to know with who I hang out."  
"We can come over this night." Gargie suggested. "After Marie's ballet classes, right?" He watched me hopefully, so he wouldn't have to deal with the stepmother  
"I suppose we can." I sighed. "It will be late though."  
"That's alright." Oliver said. "My uncle will be in work till late anyway."

I was meant to meet them after the ballet class, and but something came up. I had one of my three dogs with me as I always did during the night; I didn't feel safe walking home alone, so I took Thorin, our huge Karelian bear dog with me. Usually Gargie would take my dog with him during my classes, but Thorin he wouldn't. He was hard one to take care of, if you were a stranger to him.  
"Madame Perrault is going to kill me." I sighed.  
"No she's not." Gargie happily said.  
"Yes, she is." I growled. "She hates dogs."  
"She won't know it's yours." Gargie said.  
"Oh, yes – she will." I said as I departed and went in the same alley I had used as a short cut to the ballet studio for three months. Thorin was following me of course, it wasn't his first visit here, we both knew exactly where we were going to, just straight ahead, this alley was bigger than you would think, and it was easy to get lost in here, that's why you just have to follow the path. It was really dark; there was nothing that could lighten this place up, or now that I think about it, there should be a street lamb but it wasn't working anyway. I heard some steps behind me, Thorin started to growl, but I assumed it was just same old drunk who kind of lived in this alley, but he didn't bother anybody if you didn't bother him that is. But as the step came closer, I noticed they sounded somehow harder, you know like those robots make while moving in the movies, after a while it started to creep me out.  
"I should stop reading creepy pastas before going to bed." I mumbled to myself. Thorin started to bark loudly.  
"What is it?" I asked, Thorin turned around and kept growling at the alley behind us. I watched behind my back, not realizing what the heck he was growling at.  
There was a pair of glowing red eyes, staring at us. I stared at them little while, until I stepped back, the trash can behind me fell and made a loud noise by falling. I watched whoever it was staring at me, it made this mechanic voice – like a machine but it was something else, as it stepped one step ahead, I noticed it was holding a sword of some kind, part of me knew that it wasn't meant as ornament. Thorin stood in front of me, ready to protect me if it was necessary, but this time – I knew, he wouldn't have a chance. I grabbed his leash and pulled him beside me, all I could think was run away, and I did. Thorin didn't hesitate to follow me, but I knew he would rather stay and fight if I would let him.

The thing followed me and it was fast, with one jump it was in front of me and raised its sword to strike me. I stepped back for I didn't know what to do, I could run back to another direction but it would just follow me there. Thorin growled at it and placed himself between me and the thing, The sword strike, tearing the leash a part, I watched as my dog crouched and was ready to attack the foe that threated us.  
"Don't." I told him, since I was pretty sure this wouldn't end well for him. I breathed in and out, as she had told me to do if I would ever have to face a situation like this one.  
Calm yourself, don't panic, if you do, you probably won't get out of here unharmed. I looked at the thing, and then I looked around me, is there anything I can use to defend myself. Only thing there was, was that fallen trash can lying in the middle of the road.  
"Thorin, don't attack." I told my dog, which was very close to jumping and fighting the thing.  
"Distract it." I told him. "But don't get killed." He looked at me, like he would have understood what I said, as he approached the thing growling and barking to it, it stared at the animal for a while, probably thinking what stupid dog it was.  
I went to the trash can and kicked it, the trash can rolled down to the thing and made it fell, as it didn't see what was coming until it was too late. Luckily Thorin dodged it and returned to my side, the thing still had the sword in its hand but it looked like it wasn't going to stand up from the ground, trash can was some-where near it.  
"Come on, let's go!" I told my dog as we ran by it; I suddenly felt a pain on my left ankle as something sharp would have struck on it. I couldn't help to growl, for it did hurt, not much but still did and I didn't expect that. I fell down against the ground, soon enough I felt the pain on my knee, I think it was bleeding but to my surprise the thing that chased me had lost interest for me and its head was turned back to the alley, there was someone else standing, I didn't see who it was, it was too dark for that, but instead, I heard his voice, sort of rough voice:  
"What's wrong Karai?" He asked. "Can't control your toys anymore?"  
I blinked my eyes. Was he talking to me? What a dumb question Marie, of course he was – or I think for there was no one else to talk to. I didn't like his tone, it sounded as he was expecting me to kick that things butt, and now disappointed that I didn't. I felt so stupid, but as the thing had lost its interest on me, I quickly rose up and ran.  
"Hey!" He shouted. "I'm not done with you yet!" Then I heard the noise, that kind of noise anyone would make when bitten by a dog.  
"Tule jo, Thorin!" I yelled at my dog, he heard me and for a second he had left the stranger he had bitten and returned to my side. I didn't stop running until I was out of that alley. Until I was near enough the ballet studio.

"Ok, Marie. Let's act normal." I told myself as I entered the building. "And as for you." I looked at my Karelian bear dog and it looked back, worried.  
"Stay here, don't go anywhere, be nice." I said. "It's alright. It won't come back." Or that is what I told myself.  
As I entered the dressing room, of course there was the official gossip club going on. I didn't like it here, but at least I got to dance.  
"I think she made those scars by herself, you know for attention." Said the girl who was at the center of other dancers around 16 years just like myself, she had annoying tone on her very girly voice. I had no doubt that she was talking to me; I haven't been nothing more than their subject of gossip for the last three months. She, Tiffany King thought of herself as a ruler of this universe, she was the best dancer of our group and sure acted that way. Anyway, her friend messed up with the drugs, she was taken to detoxification, and she had no way back to this company, I came here to replace her, which pissed her highness, so she decided to mock me, gossip about me and do whatever it took to make me quit. Sorry to disappoint, honey – I'm not going anywhere.

If there was something I loved, it was ballet, dancing seemed to take everything away, even the fear I felt only a moments ago. They were all great dancers and after I failed to do my moves I had practiced and practiced, they all do that, but only a few would come here during the weekends, I did, because I had nothing better to do, I didn't fancy being alone in the house anyway.  
Sometimes when I dance I sort of loose it, forget everything around me, according to our teacher that is what supposed to be happening, true art of ballet is not faking your feelings and dancing like a machine – as she puts it. Sometimes I felt like dancing was my only talent.  
"Hey watch it!" The queen of our group yelled at me, for I almost kicked her with my feet.  
"Well, excuse me." I mumbled sarcastically.  
"What?" She asked, trying to make me sound stupid. "Stupid Asian street kid!"  
"Ouch, that hurt." I said her, again sarcastically.  
"Ladies." Our teacher Madame Perrault called all of us; she had a heavy French accent on her voice. "Prepare to show your pirouettes."  
No. Not that. Last time we did that, let's just say they gossiped how bad dancer I was and how they shouldn't have accept me to join in for weeks.  
"Get it together." I told myself as the first one went and did her spinning around. "Don't think about how great others did it, just listen to the music and go with it. You can't fail as long as you do that, just forgot everything around you."  
I closed my eyes, tried to focus, then she called my name. Ok, Marie – this is it. I walked out of the line of ballerinas, right to the middle of the room and got started. I managed to spin around few times, then when the last one came, I thought I was going to fail yet again, but I managed to save the situation with grand pattement, or almost one. It's this move where a dancer stands on her toes while her other foot is raised high up in the air, of course my left foot didn't reach that high as it should've if this was done perfectly, but at least I didn't fail this time. I could breathe easily again. Madame stared at me for a second and nodded with approval. I returned to the line, but only to hear Tiffany stating what was on her mind.  
"No she's just showing off. She's just trying to get attention to herself."  
Oh shut up, I thought and rolled my eyes, and then I yawned for I was tired. And they started to talk some more, I didn't know Tiffany very well (and believe me I didn't want to) but now she would tell the others that I probably used drugs as well. Sometimes I wondered if that girl had no life for herself, since all she did was trying to make my life miserable – without even succeeding with that.  
"Mademoiselle Blomgren, I want to have a word with you." Madame told me after we did our reverences like always before ending the lesson.  
They started to whispering, some dancer mates (or whatever I should call them) I had...  
Unlucky for me, her cellphone started ring, she told me to wait here and I did.

I stood there for a while, yawned again and waited some more.  
"Jeez. It's getting cold here." I said. "Could she finish that call already?" I got bored of waiting after some time I decided to dance some more, just to pass the time. There was no music, but as I closed my eyes and imagined there to be as I would dance somewhere around nature, in the place only I would know – as if such place would even exist. This was like that time in the past, when I was still a child; I would stay after classes and dance on my own, for I didn't want to return to that place. I stood on my toes and became jumping, landing on my toes perfectly, still my eyes closed I started to spin around slowly, I had no fear of failing this time – and even if I did fail, no one was here to see it. Then I jumped up, as If I could feel the gentle breeze of the wind blowing against me, caressing my face, as I landed back to my feet, I felt another breeze, cold and piercing this time. I opened my eyes as I head someone talking.  
"Didn't know you had a soft side, Karai."  
I startled and looked behind me, someone was standing right behind me. Someone who looked nothing like a human being. He looked like a giant, I mean human sized turtle, he had dark green skin and some bandana on his face, I didn't know what was the point of it, but I figured out I've danced way too much and with all spinning around my head was getting confused, so he had to be a hallucination of some kind. I narrowed my eyes and blinked; he was still there staring at me with his emerald green eyes and didn't look too happy. I blinked my eyes once again, but he didn't go anywhere, so I slapped myself on the cheek, hoping that the light pain caused by it would take the mean looking hallucination turtle away, but it didn't. The human sized turtle was still there staring.  
"What the heck is that thing?" I asked aloud to myself, which wasn't very clever thing to ask. "Mad man in a reptile costume?"  
"Who are you calling mad?" The greenie asked and sounded quite pissed. I looked around me for a second and then looked back to a giant turtle.  
"You." I answered. For a moment it looked like he was going to say something very nasty, but the noise of shattering glass interrupted him. I noticed that both of the two windows in the back were broken. Someone stood in the corner of the room, that someone kept doing this mechanic voice, the same kind of voice I've heard in the alley. It stood there for a second and I think he stared us. I noticed Greenie, I mean the turtle or whatever he was drew out his weapons, two dagger like weapons and grinned. They clashed, or the turtle did, it seemed like that someone didn't seem very interested. As I stepped one step forward, I was going for the door to be correct, the one making that creepy sound, simply ignoring the Greenie, which made him even angrier, he growled out pretty lowly. The thing reached me with only one jump, and it was already standing between me and the door.  
"You again." I sighed. It drew out it sword and pointed it at me. I stepped few steps back and jumped, I meant to land behind it and save myself with going out of the door. But instead I went and landed on the top of it, I mean his, whatever's head or my left foot did, I used the head only a stopping point I would use only for help with jumping and landing right where I wanted to. I landed right in front of the door; I rushed to open it go out.  
"Oh no, you won't!" Greenie shouted, I didn't know if he meant me or the blade guy.

I ran to the corridor, soon I encountered Madame, who was just finishing the phone call.  
"Mademoiselle Blomgren." She asked. "I want to speak with you."  
"Not now. I'm in hurry!" I said quickly. "Can we speak another time? I'm late!"  
"Of course but..." She said.  
"And don't go into that room, there is some mad man dressed as a reptile." I told her only to hear the voice growling at me.  
"Who are you calling mad?!"  
"Guess!" I shouted back at him as I ran through the corridor, right to the girl's dressing room.  
Then I heard the strong barking. Black dog ran to me, from the other side of the corridor.  
"Thorin, am I glad to see you, buddy." I sighed. I stooped down and put my hands around his neck gently, and I pressed my face against the coarse fur of Karelian bear dog. Thorin started squeak, as if he'd understood the feeling I hadn't, I was quite scared of what had happened.  
"It's alright." I tried to convince myself. "It's alright, it was just.. Something." I didn't know what was going on in there, and why that mechanic voices making thing attacked me. I sighed again and stood up; I opened the dressing room's door and went inside with my dog. Of course it was gossiping time, I didn't bother hearing what was it about. I wanted to get a hell away from here as fast I possibly could.  
"Ew." Said the high pitched voice said as packed my ankle boots in the plastic back, where I usually kept my ballet shoes.  
"Take that thing out." Someone demanded as I put my jacket on me and packed my clothes in my bag.  
"Oh, come on." I sighed. "He won't do anything to you, unless you're a bear or a rabbit." Thorin didn't even care about others; he stared at the door ready to go whenever I told him so. I raised the bag on my back and nodded at him.

As we went outside, it was getting cold, wind was getting worse. I shivered, I didn't mind the cold, but I didn't practically like this weather.  
Thorin looked the building opposite to us and started to growl.  
"Let's just go.." I said but then I heard my cellphone ringing. I had dig it up from my bag, luckily the ringer was used to waiting for me to answer the phone. Caller was Gargie.  
"Yeah?" I asked.  
"Hey, Frosty." He said. "I know this is late but Oliver kind of got sick so we have to cancel the plans."  
"Oh." I said slowly, it was like I didn't understand what my best friend had told me. "That's too bad. Should I call him?"  
"I don't think Oliver is up to speaking. You know daddy issues." Gargie told me.  
"I see." I answered. "Well.."  
Then I heard the mechanic voice behind my back. I screamed as I was almost hit by something but I managed to dodge it, nearly at least.  
"Maria?" Gargie called. "Is something wrong?"  
"Uh, G – I don't think this is good time." I said awkwardly. "I'll talk you tomorrow at school." I didn't wait for his reply; I stopped the call only to be hit by something sharp, I could feel my left cheek bleeding. Thorin barked, and before I got to chance to tell him not to, he was already jumped on the attacker, then he squeaked in pain and fell down on his knees – if you could say that.  
"Thorin!" I yelled, as I looked my most loyal friend trying to rise on his paws, for he was too stubborn to give up. Luckily the thing wasn't interested in the wounded animal, it was me it was after. It turned its head to look at me, I pressed my feet against the ground and narrowed my eyes and stared back. This Time It's Personal.

I tried to kick the thing, which didn't help, I only managed to hurt myself, when I kicked it, I heard the glonk noise coming from the place I kicked, stomach, I felt a slight pain in my foot, the same kind of pain you feel when you kick the wall made of bricks.  
"Ow." Was the only thing I could say to that, and another "ow" when I felt something sharp sank in my leg. I managed to keep my pressed on the place I've kicked the thing, I pushed it back - I wasn't quite sure if it would work, but it did, I managed to push it away, at least a little. I put my whole weight into it and the thing fell down, but before it I managed to kick the sword wielding hand of its, so the blade fell on the ground. I was trembling, my whole body was.  
"Thorin?" I asked as stepped back.  
Then I fell against the wall.  
The thing that was after me didn't strike this time, for its head was missing and in front of me – I don't believe it, was standing the human sized turtle.  
"That was pathetic, Karai." He said. Thorin jumped between us, I should've known he wouldn't be so easily beaten. He growled and showed his teeth to Greenie.  
"And here I thought you were a knight in shining armor, saving damsels in distress." I said sarcastically, I put my hand on my forehead and tried to sound as dramatic as I possibly could, of course I was only mocking the green dude.  
"And instead I see a foulmouthed amphibian with the subtlety of a sledgehammer. "  
I stood up and looked the thing without its head, I touched it's body carefully with my foot, it just lied there and didn't look like it was going to try and kill me again so I kneeled before it, and started to move its hands, they were all made of metal. That would explain the pain I felt as I kicked it.  
"Are you listening to me?!" Greenie shouted.  
"Is it a robot?" I asked to myself. "I wonder how it's builded.."  
The bark of Thorin woke me up from my wondering state. Greenie seemed like he had stepped back few steps as my dog looked like he was going to attack him anytime.  
"Don't play dumb with me, Karai." Greenie sighed. "You're the one who commands them."  
"What was that?" I asked as I stood up once more. "And stop calling me that, Greenie."  
"What are you going to do?" He asked and sounded amused. I was going to say something nasty to him, for I was getting tired of him accusing me for something and calling me someone named Kara, but then I noticed a pair of glowing red eyes behind him.  
"Thorin, let's get the hell out of here." I told the dog in Finnish. I stepped back and so did he, we went running once again. And that was it.

You know the feeling you think everything is fine, then mad man in reptile costume jumps out of his hiding place – or he was more like thrown by something and landed less gracefully at my feet.  
"You again." I said with boredom.  
"Do me a favor Karai and.." He growled while raising back to his green feet.  
"My name is NOT freaking Kara!" I yelled at him. He was starting to anger me, for calling me with wrong name; yet again he couldn't know my real name but I didn't care.  
"Yeah right." He said like he thought I was lying. "Then what is it?" Before I had the chance to reply, same kind of robot Greenie had beheaded earlier walked or jumped out of nowhere.. As it approached I didn't know what else to do so I kicked it away.  
"It's Marie!" I shouted while doing this.  
"What?" Greenie shouted back as he was trying to behead the robot by jumping behind it and insidiously stabbing it bacl with his dagger or whatever it was, however the robot could see this coming and put his sword between them.  
I got this crazy idea and I charged and tried to push it near the water. I was quite sure the robot wouldn't be water proofed, but then again I hadn't seen real walking thing.  
"Hard one, aren't you?" I said, holding my aching ribs. The robot made the mechanic voice once as it stared at me with its glowing red eyes. Thorin tried to do something to help, it bit robot's angle, but of course dogs teeth against the hard metal didn't do much damage. The robot kicked Thorin off, and he was dropped in the river.  
I watched if he remained unharmed – or mostly anyway. Then I stared the water for a second.  
"What have you done with that?" Greenie, who was somehow beside me asked.  
"Nothing. I just took a short cut and it pissed him off." I told him.  
"You and your bossing around pissed it off?" He asked.  
"I haven't seen that think in my life!" I yelled as I jumped in order to dodge the cutting sword at my face.  
"Quit that play already!" Greenie shouted as he kicked the robot.  
"You would know everything about plays!" I shouted and charged once again, this time it fell down, for it didn't have the time to gather enough balance after the strong kick. Halfway down it grabbed me, I struggled, kicked, punched, basically I tried everything to get the thing off me. It gave up eventually and let me go, I think it drowned.

"What is this? A wig?"  
And someone grabbed my from my hair, after fighting with the robot my bun was destroyed. I didn't wait to see who it that grabbed me was, I grabbed the hand of the grabber – sounds stupid, but that's what I did. I knew how to force the people to fall, you know for the self-defense, so that's what I did. He fell to the water and I stared at him, narrowing my eyes and raising my hands above my face, ready to slap or hit him if it came to it. Greenie looked slightly surprised. My dog was already beside me, barking at the turtle.  
"Aletaan painua." I told Thorin as I climbed up from the river, I took my things and ran, Thorin did too, he ran by my side the whole way home, I didn't look behind me, because this was crazy, and I think I was kind of scared, where had my safe world gone?

"Mom, I'm home!" I yelled as I stepped in from the door. Of course, the russet Spitz was there to welcome me; I kneeled down and hugged her. I was trembling, for fear, for cold – does it even matter? She turned her head and started to lick my cheek.  
"I need to get changed." I said and stood up. Storm barked with agreement. I went upstairs in my room, I put on my favorite jumper and pants, then I heard all three dogs barking at my window.  
I watched outside, I could see nothing but darkness, and trees floating in it.  
"What's wrong?" I asked. I went and opened the window, then I saw something human-like moving in that tree.  
"You realize I can see you right?" I asked him sarcastically. "What are you doing here?"  
"Just taking a walk." Greenie answered.  
"Around our property?" I asked.  
"Geez, I thought you were going to scream and tell me to get lost before your parents come in."  
"Oh my gosh, it's a walking lizard!" I played along sarcastically.  
"Turtle." Greenie said as he stepped – more likely jumped out of the shadow, on the top of the canopy.  
"You're wounded." I told him as I noticed a scratch on his right shoulder.  
"So are you." He pointed out my cheek and wrist, it seemed I had few scratches in there too.  
"Why are you here?" I repeated.  
He didn't reply, he just watched three dogs, one of them, white German Shepperd was still barking and Thorin continued growling. Mom, I mean Storm walked beside me and watched our guest with curiosity.  
"Roy, stop that." I sighed. "It's only mad man in a reptile costume, I think we can manage if he tries to kill me."  
Turtle boy looked me with amused smile.  
"I'll kick him in the face with my ballet shoes." I told him. I swear I could hear her some-what silent laughing coming from his direction. I moved myself a side from the window, and he jumped in and looked me, like he was waiting someone else standing in my place.  
"Who are you?" He asked.  
"I'm Marie Blomgren and I'm a ballet dancer." I simply said.  
"You sure of that?" He asked, trying to sound so though, but if he was going to kill me, he would've drawn his weapon already.  
"No, I suffer from a memory loss." I said sarcastically. "Come on."  
"Are you sure you don't have anyone lurking around here?" He asked.  
"It's just me and these guys." I told him.

"Sit there." I told him and pointed old couch. Storm sat on the floor as I went to look for some disinfectant and bandages, but of course we didn't have any. There was some kind of stuff for cleaning wounds, but you don't need to know what it was.  
He was standing in front of our bookshelf, where we kept some family photos, mainly photos of me at different ages. He looked the photo of me and my dad, taken from the hunting trip last summer.  
"That's me and my dad." I said.  
"Your dad?" He repeated.  
"He is hunting somewhere in Russia as we speak." I told him with a smile.  
"And your mom?"  
I looked at him distantly for a moment. "Never knew her."  
Then the awkward silent came.  
"You don't happen to have any siblings?" Greenie asked.  
"No, it's just me." I replied.  
"I see." Now it was his turn to sound distant. I opened the bottle of liquid meant for cleaning wounds and dropped few drops of it on the toilet paper.  
"What the heck is that stuff?" He asked loudly. "It smells disgusting."  
"For cleaning wounds." I said. "We don't have anything else at the moment."  
I knew that it would sting a little bit, so I wasn't surprised to see him that kind of face when you had to go through something unpleasant. I tied and old bandana, white one with black pattern around his shoulder.  
"What is this for?" He asked. "It's not like this is deep wound, it's just a scratch."  
"Just in case." I replied. "Dad always does this even if it's just a scratch."

"I should get going." Greenie said after that. I nodded and walked him back upstairs, I wanted to make sure he left properly, for I didn't want to find a giant turtle (or mad man in a reptile costume) sleeping in my closet. "Night, Greenie." I told him as he was about to climb out from the open window.  
"It's Raph." He said without turning around. And then he was gone.

As for me, I went straight to bed, after I made sure that every window and door in this god damned house was locked. Although my night had been a madness, I fell into a deep sleep.

* * *

**A/N Part 2: **I have written two versions of this chapter, one with Marie's POV and one of Raph's POV - it was just for fun, I wanted to write about how Raph saw Marie and felt like things that were going on in this chapter. I will be using it or parts of it later on in one chapter.

As for translations - I don't think many non-Finnish speaking can read or understand what Marie is saying.  
"Tule jo, Thorin!" - Means "Come on, Thorin!" or "Come on already."  
"Aletaan painua" means "Let's get away from here"


	4. Chapter 2 - All American creepiness

**A/N:** My god I hated to write this chapter. This was just so hard to write, first part with Marie meeting April went smoothly. But the second part – it was just horrible. I know it is horrible reading. And no, April isn't going to be friends with Marie – I just don't see them as friends. Yes, I know many of you are going to hate me and OC Hannes for calling April names, I was going to smoothen it up but when I tried, I noticed that it would change the whole character of Hannes, he is meant to be mean and harsh, reason why it is explained later on, of course there's a small hint hidden in the text, you can go and try to guess what it is.

Chapter two – All American Creepiness

The next day was perfectly normal, at first. It was actually so normal that I had to wonder was it just a dream, yesterday night I mean. For one, Oliver wasn't sick at all – like Gargie said he was. He just seemed not to have slept the whole night. When he was tired, he seemed even tinier as usual, his straw yellow hair was all tangled and his eyes were fighting for staying open. One thing I noticed wasn't normal was a small scratch on his right cheek.  
"Oliver?" I asked. "Morning?"  
He startled as he turned around.  
"Oh! It was just you Marie, I was just.."  
"Something wrong?" I asked.  
"N-No!" He said with trembling voice. "Why do you think that?"  
"You just look like you just rose from the grave." I told him.  
"Oh. That." He said slowly as he wouldn't understand what I was saying. "I didn't sleep well last night."  
"Had bad dreams?" I asked while I opened the door for him.  
"No, I just.. Had a lot on my mind." The same slow tone continued as he entered the school. We went to stairs, I was silent, part of me wanted to ask if he wanted to talk about it, but then maybe I shouldn't I mean, we didn't know anything about each other's, not really. We had known each other for three months, but that's all, it's not like we were close friends or anything. I opened my mouth to say something anything, to make him cheer up a bit, but another voice covered mine.  
"Marie Wilhelmina Blomgren, for god's sake!" Here comes my best friend. He hurried to catch us on the corridor and then he grabbed me from my shoulder.  
"Just tell me what happened last night." He said as he was shaking me. "What was with the screaming? Did someone attack you? You're not hurt, are you?"  
Attack is a strong word, at least when I think of last night. Seriously, I can't tell him that I was chased by a freaking human sized turtle and a psycho robot which tried to kill me, even if Gargie (not his real name by the way) is my best friend, I don't think he would believe me if I honestly told him about it. He would probably drag me to see his dad, who worked at the hospital and tell him that Marie has gone little crazy.  
"I'm not hurt. Some crazy dude just decided to break both of the windows in the ballet studio while I was still dancing." I told him. "And when you called me, Thorin tried to run away, so.."  
"Oh." He replied and gave me intense stare with his mint green eyes, something told me, he didn't believe entirely believe my story. But it was true, most of it anyway. Some crazy dude did crash one of the windows, but he wasn't quite human, but Gargie doesn't need to know that.

Whatever, I told myself. I am never going to tell anyone about last night, not even to that old hag, if she knew I was attacked I could kiss my peaceful life goodbye, for she would take a quick flight here and firstly scream my ears to deaf and then.. I don't want even think about it. She would drag herself here even if she knew my dad had left for another hunting trip and I was living by myself – it wasn't proper, she thought, she would come here with all her rules and orders to break my easy life a part, and that – I didn't want. Besides I think it was just something that happened, I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. I wasn't concerned for me, I was more concerned about Oliver and that scar of his, his cheek was just fine yesterday at school and now after meeting his father it just wasn't. Ok, maybe I'm over thinking this, but something is bothering him, I'll ask him about it later. As I said everything was perfectly normal, so was school, though I hate to admit it, because in every morning Nils – loud mouth who sat next to me he did what he knew best, that was annoying me by picking on my shoulder with his finger while calling me "Ma-Ma." - that's just stupidest nickname ever.  
"Someone sure misses his mama." Gargie said, causing me to smile.  
But when it continues every ten seconds, it can be really annoying, and Nils he was bored, so there was no way he was going quit.  
"Seriously, Nils!" I yelled, annoyed. "Stop it already!" After that I added few Finnish curses, which you don't need to know. There was text in black board that said.  
_Art classes 10 am. To 12 am. In Roosevelt high school._  
"Seriously?" I asked. "Campus is this big and we don't have art class?"  
But before our homeroom teacher could reply, my former neighbor stepped in the class. His right eye was all purple.  
Most people would say: "I'm sorry for being late." but that wasn't the case with Hannes, he was this though big guy who would always be in fights with other students, he was that kind guy you wouldn't want to mess with, he was big - or should I say huge boy, muscular and all, he had light brown hair he never seemed to brush, he had small light blue eyes but most of all he was really tall.

"What happened to him?" Oliver asked quietly. He was kind of afraid of the big dude, and who wouldn't be? Even I was, though we had been neighbors in Finland, I never knew him that well; I had been friends with his sister for almost five years though.  
"He probably got into fight with somebody." Gargie said silently. He squeaked with high pitched voice as Hannes glared at him.  
"Good that you decided to join us, Johannes." Our homeroom teacher said peacefully. Hannes mumbled something as he went to his backseat.  
"And do remember to come back here after the class." Homeroom teacher reminded. "Do not fool around in the city - did you hear me, Nils?"  
Judging for his position, he was about to continue picking me again.  
"What?" He asked.  
"You go to art classes in nearest high school." Thorsten Ek explained patiently. "And please do not go fooling around to the city instead."  
"Why not?" Nils jokingly asked. "Let's do it, guys!" And by guys he meant his two sidekicks Emil and Casper. I sighed and wondered how he even got into this school. I didn't know where the heck this Roosevelt High school even was and I wasn't keen on going there, I hated moving to place to place just because of few classes. Luckily Gargie decided to google it – so we wouldn't get lost, which was very easy to do in such big city as this.

Me, Oliver and Gargie headed to the high school together, Hannes was some-what behind us whole way, we didn't dare to ask him to join us, since he seemed to be angry and prefer his own company. The school itself was only few blocks away, so we made it there in time – unlike Nils and the company whom I didn't see coming. High school seemed like normal place, just like our old middle school, but of course five times bigger.  
"Who wants to go in first?" Oliver asked.  
"I'll pass." Gargie said, then the both of them looked at me.  
"Don't look at me." I told them, and then I heard a frustrated growl behind me.  
"Antakaa mun kaikki kestää." Hannes sighed as he passed us, going straight to the front door and into the school.  
"Come on." I said to them. "Let's go, we look stupid if we just stand here."  
"True." Gargie grabbed me by hand.  
"What are you doing?" I asked.  
"Just making sure any of us isn't going to get lost." He replied with a stupidest smile on his face. "And besides this is America."  
"Meaning?" Oliver asked.  
"Some crazy bitch could attack Marie anytime behind the corner." Gargie explained. I was sure he was only joking, but it would be fun to see how he was going to protect me against someone like that.  
"So you will be my protector, huh?" I asked. "Great. I've always wanted a geek knight in shining armor for my protection."  
Gargie laughed, he knew I was only kidding. Oliver looked at us, there was this distant look in his eyes, like he was missing something.  
"Don't tell me, you need a hand too." I jokingly suggested and held out my free hand to him. For a second it looked like he was going to take the offer, but then he said.  
"Nah, I just follow you guys."

High School didn't look any different than other school I had seen, corridors were full of students getting to next classes. There was no school uniforms, so we kind of stick out.  
"Oh, great, now we stick out like a handful of painful thumbs." Gargie sighed. "I knew these clown costumes wouldn't get us anything but trouble."  
"This is my sis's school." Oliver said quietly. "She gets lots of teasing because she's bit older than rest of the students."  
"Well you can't help it." I told him. "In Finland we start high school or whatever when we are 16 years old."  
"My sis flunked first year in home too." Oliver sighed. We went up the stairs to find the classroom, as we were trying to do that in crowded stairs a girl with ginger hair pulled back with small ponytail walked pass us. She took one look on me and her blue eyes narrowed and she looked like she would want to kill me. I got this sense of danger in my belly.  
"You." She whispered kind of loud so my friends could hear it. For some reason, Gargie started to laugh, he might think it sounded funny.  
"Hey April, do you know that girl?" Her friend who walked beside her asked.  
"Kind of." I heard the red head answer. "Just stay away from her, she's bad news."  
Nice, I thought, I never had seen you before, but the way you judge is making me dislike you already.  
"Why would she say such thing?" Oliver asked in our mother tongue of course, since what is the idea of speaking English between friends who understood the same language.  
"Beats me." I told him. For one I had never seen this girl and second she couldn't know me from anywhere, she must've been one of those people who just decide: I don't like for no reason at all, so I'm going to spread some rumors about you, - it's not like haven't seen that before.  
"It's not like this is any different from LP Middle school." Gargie said. "Just don't mind."  
"Don't worry, I won't." I told him.

Soon enough Oliver spotted his sister somewhere and went to talk to her – he wanted to tell her not to come and say something embarrassing, it must be nice to have a sister. Gargie left me standing in front of the toilet when he had to do what every man must when the time comes. So there was I, minding my own business and yawning, when someone crabbed me from my shoulder, however I managed to force the person to fall by grabbing his or hers hand and pulling her the way someone would do somersault, I kind of spin the thing above my shoulder so it landed right in front of me. It was the red haired girl I saw earlier, she looked like a cheerleader from one of those stupid American comedies they showed on TV, with perfect pretty face, blue eyes and freckles.  
"I'm Sorry." I said and let her go.  
"What are you doing here?" She asked attacking tone in her voice.  
"Going to art classes." I replied.  
"Yeah, right." She said while standing up. "You're here for me, aren't you?"  
"Why would I be here for you if I don't even know you?" I asked. "And believe me; I don't think I don't even want to. Tell me, is attacking people like a hobby to you?"  
"Not as much as yours!" She shouted, and then she literally tried hitting me with her right fist. I dodged it by squatting down.  
"Chill out will you!" I yelled back at her. "Do I look the one who is looking for a fight, here?"  
"Guess for yourself!" She replied and tried to punch me again, I jumped back and before I could think anything to do, I didn't want to hurt the girl, no matter how much I started to dislike her and besides we were in the **school** if I did anything, hit her for example I would be in trouble with the principal.  
"Marie!" I heard Oliver calling me; I turned around and saw him standing there with a taller girl with short sandy colored hair and same cerulean blue as he did. Then I got kicked on the ground. Luckily door of the toilet hit her straight to the face.  
"Why are you lying there?" Gargie asked as he closed the door and realized he had hit someone with it. It was needless to say what had happened judging from the look on her face.  
"I told you some crazy bitch would attack you behind the corner!" He almost shouted. "I knew it! America is full of creepiness!"  
"Yeah, you got that right." I mumbled as Gargie held out his hand, I grabbed it and he pulled me back on feet again.  
"Are you alright?" He asked.  
"No injuries so I'm good." I told him, we went to Oliver and his sister who looked exited of meeting us.  
"Don't even think about it, you little wench!" I heard a loud voice shouting and the growling, I saw Hannes pulling her hand behind her back while taking some kind of iron fan from her free hand.  
"You were going to throw this at her, didn't you?" He exclaimed. "Just tell me, has Marie done something to you or are you just some psycho?!"  
"Marie?" The girl asked. "No, her name is.."  
"I know what her name is!" Hannes said angrily. "And if I ever see you trying to do such thing again you'll be so sorry!"  
"Hey, you let go of April." Another boy passing by said. He had black hair and black bandana around his head.  
"This slut belongs to you, Jonesy?" Hannes asked bitterly. "I can see why."  
"Stop calling her names, Strom!" New guy said, and didn't sound too happy.  
"It's Ström, but I don't think a brain worm like you would know the difference." Okay, this is what happens when Hannes does the thing he is the best, starting fights with anyone.  
"What did you call me?" Black haired guy raised his voice.  
"You heard me." Hannes looked down on him, since the black haired guy was half as big as Hannes was.  
"Hey if this is about last night I said I was sor.." He said.  
"You will be the next time you'll come to the ice ring." Hannes threatened that other thing he was good at.

He let the girl go and continued.  
"Do you tend to attack people you haven't familiar with around here?" He asked suddenly calmly.  
"I know her!" The girl protested. "She is called Ka.."  
"Marie." Hannes called out. "Do you know this girl?"  
"No." I said truthfully. "I've never seen her in my life." I was quite surprised since Hannes had never called me by name, he always said something like: "Hey, you." while talking to me.  
"That's it then." He said. "Come on you three, art class is this way."  
We followed him of course, Gargie was holding my hand tightly, and I didn't mind him doing so, because speaking the truth, I was quite shaking, never before I had been attacked inside the school building. But then again, this is America a country full of creepiness. These things must happen every day.

I don't consider myself very lucky person, but today I must've been without luck, since guess who was in same art classes as me. My newly founded friend, the red head. She had a friend with her, gothic girl who had short black hair with purple streaks.  
As I passed by them, I heard the red head ask.  
"Who are those guys?"  
"They are students from some private academy nearby." Her friend told her. I sat on the same table as Oliver and Gargie, Hannes joined us too, maybe he thought it was stupid to sit by himself or surrounded by unknown people. Art classes weren't that bad, I liked drawing and stuff – at least teacher wasn't as aim to be perfect as our former teacher and besides we get to listen to classical music, mainly it was from Sleeping beauty and Giselle, I think it was because we were to draw something heartwarming and romantic. I have no idea what Gargie drew, I tried to take a look but he wouldn't let me, it turned out Oliver couldn't draw and as usual, Hannes didn't say a word. That is until he went to get some water and brushes from the closet. That girl was talking with her friend and looked at me with the look that promised nothing good for me.  
"Why won't you shut up damn cow?" He said. "Marie has lived on my neighborhood in Finland for five damn years, so don't you go and spread some rumors when you don't even know the person!"  
Ginger haired girl looked at Hannes for a while. Like someone that has gone mad or something. The black haired guy sitting on the same table as ginger head and the Goth stood up.  
"Don't speak to April like that!"  
"I speak the way I want to, to whoever I want to." Hannes said, he stood there a glass full of water, for a moment I thought he was going pour it down on the guy but instead Hannes just rolled his eyes and returned to the table.  
"There." He said and put the brushes he had taken middle of the table. Then he sat and didn't even look at us. It bothered me, so I took a piece of paper and wrote down: "What was that about." I pushed paper to him. He looked at me before writing an answer to paper.  
"Nothing just some random broad thinking you were a psycho serial killer."  
"Seriously?" I asked. Hannes grinned. Gargie looked curiously the paper over my shoulder and burst to laugh.  
"I can so imagine that! Marie the serial killer, you know like that Jane from the creepy story."  
"Have you been watching slasher films again?" I rolled my eyes.

We decided not to eat in the high school; we bought some burgers from the place called Rawst and went back to the campus. Nils and his small gang returned there few hours later. I admit that the rest of the day was kind of boring but it wasn't that bad. I yawned as I went to the toilet. As the classes were still going on, there were no other students on the corridors, when I got out from the toilet I saw two adult men standing on the empty corridor.  
I was standing at the corner of the corridor, they couldn't see me, but I could hear them clearly. I didn't do this often, but I was too bored to go back to the class, so I thought I would stand here and look like I'm minding my own business.  
"Kraang has done the request requested by Kraang, in order to find that which needs to be found." It was man's voice, mechanical one, like a robot in those science fiction movies. It sounded funny to me.  
"The one that needs to be found it is located on the third floor." Another exactly similar voice continued. "Kraang shall go to this floor and retrieve that what needs to be found."  
It didn't sound too interesting, it sounded like someone needed to get a thing from the third floor and be on his way. I turned around to go back to class, but I was startled by someone standing right behind me. It was a man, slender man wearing a suit.  
"Hello, Slendy." I said.  
"Kraang has worked on his diet." The man said with the same mechanic voice as the last one I heard to talk. I tried to go pass him but as I tried to go my own way, walked in front of me. I tried to pass him, and he did the same thing, like he didn't want to let me go pass him.  
"Excuse me." I said slightly annoyed. "Just trying to get to class, here."  
Before I even knew what happen, that man grabbed my arm and found myself lying on the shoulder of that man, who started to creep me out.  
"Hey, let me go you moron!" I shouted at him. "Irti minusta, perkele!"  
But he didn't, and I was quite sure throwing Finnish curses at him didn't help. He walked to those other men standing in the corridor. They were all identical. I kicked the air with my feet, as that would do any good.  
"Kraang, Kraang has noticed that the sleeping gas kraang has put in that which is known as the air-condition system has no effect on this which is known as the girl."  
I felt stupid, he didn't have any hold on me, and here I was kicking into the thin air. I rolled my eyes and then I rolled myself down to the floor, I quickly stood up and started running. Luckily other men were too busy wondering what happened, so I got away. I hurried up the stairs, back to the classroom; I think I've had enough excitement for one day. The door was left open. Ok, I guess our teacher went to get a cup of coffee or something.  
"Gargie, you won't believe what hap.." I said when I stepped back the class, until I saw my classmates, they were all sleeping – Nils was snoring very loudly.  
"Uh, guys?" I said. I tried wake Gargie. I shook him, but it didn't help.  
"Gargie, wake up already! God dammit! Valdemar, get up at this instant or else..!" I even tried to imitate his mom, that usually did the trick but now he just continued his adventures in the dreamland. Some did listen to music at the back. Oliver didn't seem like sleeping, he was writing on the computer and seemed very concentrated of what he was doing.  
"Oliver?" I asked. He didn't turn around. I guess he didn't hear me at all. So I went to him and touched his shoulder.  
"Hey, Oliver!"  
He startled and looked back at me; he took the earphones off of his ears and said: "Marie! I didn't see you there."  
"I can see that." I replied.  
"Why is everybody all burn out?" He asked after noticing what I already had.  
"That's what I wanted to know." I told him. "You didn't notice a thing?"  
"No, I was writing my notes." Oliver said.

"Kraang, Kraang has found the one needed by the Kraang." Same mechanical voice said behind us. I looked at the door, there they were again, those same slendermen with suits, all three of them in fact. Oliver squeaked in horror. He looked scared or horrified would be the right word to describe it.  
"Th..They have come.." He mumbled.  
"What?" I asked. "You know those guys?"  
"N-No." He said with shivering voice. "But my dad.."  
"Kraang will take the one needed by the Kraang." One of the slendermen said and stepped closer. "One known as a girl will need to step aside."  
"Not a chance." I said and stepped between the creepy man and Oliver.  
"Kraang, Kraang must eliminate the one known as a girl that is standing between Kraang and the one needed by the Kraang."  
That didn't sound too cool, but I thought I could figure something out.. Until I saw those big guns of theirs.  
"Oh crap." I cursed. Oliver was standing behind me, right between me and the window.  
"Oliver, open the window and climb out." I told him.  
"But.." He mumbled.  
"It's the only way out!" I yelled at him. He squeaked but did what I told him to. He climbed out the window, I was going to do the same, I stepped back slowly few steps and simply climb out the window.

"What now?" Oliver asked.  
"Run!" I yelled at him. We were standing at the roof, Oliver had jumped there from the window still.  
"Where?" Oliver asked when I jumped to the roof. "There's nowhere to go."  
"We need to get down." I said, it was the only thing I could think of. "Then we need to run."  
"Do we jump? We are in third floor and I don't think it's wise." Oliver said.  
"No, we climb; there should be fire escape somewhere." I told him, but then again I wasn't quite sure about it."  
"B-But what if I fall?" Oliver asked.  
I sighed. "Oliver, we don't have a choice here..." Then something flew past my ear, Oliver shrink and finally he decided to go and do what I told him to, I followed him, after I noticed those slendermen climbing one after one to the roof. Great, now they were after us. Then Oliver stopped.  
"Go on!" I yelled at him as I tried to dodge one of lasers they shot from their guns.  
"I can't!" He yelled. "There's nowhere to go to!"  
"Jump!" I yelled. But he didn't, he waited there. Just go already! I fell down to my knees, as I noticed one more laser coming at my direction, and another one coming from another direction, I didn't have time to start dodging these, if I dodge another one, I would get hit by another one, so I threw myself – or more likely stumbled with my feet and fell – but at least I was still at one piece.  
"Marie!" I heard Oliver calling me.  
"Stay there!" I replied. My knees were aching, I guess they hadn't fully recovered from yesterday, but it wasn't going to kill me. I get back to my feet and ran to Oliver. He was shivering as he looked down to the fire escape."  
"Oliver, it's not that long." I told him. "We can't stay here, or do you want to get kidnapped by those creeps?"  
"But I'm.." He mumbled.  
I sighed. "Okay. You'll thank me later." I mean, what I was supposed to do? Wait and let those creeps kidnap him just because he was scared, I was too, though it didn't seem like it. I pushed him over.  
"What are you..!" He screamed, yes, screamed. Then I jumped over.

"Come on, you need to get up." I told him. "Are you hurt?"  
"I-I don't think so." He said.  
"Here." I stretched my hand to him. He grabbed my hand and I pulled him up. Oliver was about say something, but I didn't get a chance to hear what that was, since there was another laser coming right at us.  
"Kraang, Kraang is supposed to take the one needed by the Kraang which is not killing the one known as the one needed by the Kraang." We heard the mechanical male voice say.  
"Look out!" Oliver yelled and in next minute I found myself lying on Oliver.  
"Well, this is awkward." I told him. "But thanks anyway."

Oliver must've been in pain, because when he saved me, pulled me out of the way, we kind of fell down the metallic stairs.  
"Ow." He said as a reply.  
"Sorry, I should've been more careful." I said when I stood up.  
"That's alright." Oliver said, but it sounded painful. "Where now?"  
"We need to hide." I told him as I watched him getting back on his feet again.  
"But where?" Oliver asked as we started to run. "I don't suppose we can go to my place, my aunt is home and if those creeps follow us, she might get hurt."  
"My house is too far." I told him. "But there's one place we can go and figure something out."  
"Where's that?" Oliver asked.  
"Follow!"  
Soon enough I noticed that Oliver couldn't keep up with me. We didn't see those creeps anywhere but we both knew they were somewhere looking for us or for Oliver since they mentioned 'him' – me they just wanted dead.  
"Hey.. Ma-Marie, you.. Got good condition." Oliver panted.  
"It's the dancing. Not so light you would think." I smirked. "Don't worry, we're almost there."  
I was leading him to the place I had been just last night to gather my strenght. I hadn't shown the place to anyone before, but this was only place I could think of at the moment. For one there were no people and it was a good hiding place. I liked it there, it was peaceful and sheltered, when you want to have little bit of privacy or run away from all the noise and a packs of rushing people, this may not sound much, but to a girl who grew up in a small one-horse-town in a countryside this was much to deal with. I sat down near the water edge. Oliver sat down too.  
"Afraid of the heights?" I asked.  
"Kind of." Oliver mumbled. "I'm afraid of falling. You on the other hand don't seem to be afraid of anything."  
"Why you say that?" I asked surprised.  
"You didn't seem to be afraid of those guys, so I thought..." He explained. "Are you afraid of anything?"  
"Yeah, I am." I said quietly. "I'm not brave, at all. Oliver, only thing I'm good at is running away."  
"Why do you say that, Marie?" Oliver asked. "If it weren't for you those creeps would have taken me!"  
"Hey, about that, you mentioned your dad." I said. "Did you know those men were going to come for you?"  
"No!" He almost shouted. "My dad knew something was going to come for me and he was happy!"  
I noticed Oliver rubbing that scar of his on his cheek.  
"Your dad did that?" I asked.  
Oliver watched me terrified. "How did you..?"  
"Just lucky guess." I said and put my hand around him. "I just know where you came from, pal."  
"Uh.. Thanks." He said and sounded awkward. "I'll be fine."  
"You still got your sister." I reminded him.  
"Yeah, you should've seen my sister, she got so mad at him I thought she was going to kick the man out of the door." Oliver laughed.  
"Yeah, that's a good part of having older siblings." I sighed. "But I wouldn't know."  
"You're the only child?" Oliver asked.  
"Yeah." I nodded. "Dad considers Storm, Thorin and Roy as his children too. They're my dogs."  
"I see." Oliver said.

Then there was large BOOM behind our bags.  
"That doesn't sound good." I said. And I was right.  
"Kraang has finally managed to find the one that is needed by the Kraang." Mechanic male voice said.  
"They found us!" Oliver screamed not so manly.  
"So it seems." I said as I rose back on my feet.  
"Marie?" Oliver asked. "What are you..?"  
"I have no idea." I said to myself. But _something_ must be done, otherwise I would end up dead and Oliver – who knows what those guys were planning to do with him.  
"Kraang must take out the one that is in the way of the one needed by the Kraang." Mechanic voice said.  
Well, give me your best shot. Maybe I shouldn't think this way, even a blind man could see I was in deep trouble, and there were three of them and one of me as for Oliver, he wouldn't be any help for me. Guys with guns, if I make it out of it alive I'll always be nice to Kiriko even if she's going to be bitch to me and that she will be. Okay, Marie, calm yourself. Breath. I heard the water purling. Time to move on.

They shot at me, I managed to dodge it – I literally crawled in the dirt by doing that. I tried kicking the one that was nearest to me, but it did nothing – or it did, hurt my leg. It was like kicking the brick wall with all you got and it hurt like hell. Then I got grabbed by my foot and threw me out of the way, and then I hit my head – I think it was the brick wall built there for some reason, I've always like it, but now with hitting my head on it, I started to not to. I tried to rose up, but I couldn't I felt all dizzy. Everything around was spinning and it wouldn't stop even though I wanted to. Of course those guys weren't interested of me anymore, it was Oliver they wanted. He screamed in horror.  
Then the storm came, I mean the wind went like crazy, it must've been like tornado, because when I woke up I was lying in the river, I didn't know when I passed out but at least the cold water helped a bit, it always did. All those men were lying on the ground and Oliver was shivering. Of course they were getting back to their feet. I needed something, a weapon to defeat those guys. I wasn't kicked by a normal foot, it felt like a metal or something.  
"Wait a moment." I mumbled. I rose on my feet and started looking the river. That robot from yesterday had a sword, if someone hadn't been digging around.

"N-No!" Oliver yelled. "If you come any closer I do that again! And don't touch Marie o-or else!"  
"Kraang will now complete the mission which is taking the one needed by the Kraang to the place which is-"  
Then the head of now speaking man lost its head.  
"Wow, this IS sharp." I said. Then I stroke the blade on the other one's back. It wasn't a human I hit; right now I didn't even care.  
"Marie!" Oliver yelled. "You're alright!"  
"Yeah!" I said. I tried to pull the sword out of whatever this thing was, but it was stuck. "Help!"  
Just because the other man was no trying to kill me, I tried kicking at the same time I tried to pull the weapon out. Then the wind came again, it wasn't as tornado-like as earlier but it did the job, the last man standing kind of broke its head to the brick wall. Then something pink and slimy jumped on my face.  
"Eww!"  
"What the heck is that?" Oliver screamed. Then the thing jumped off my face, so I could see it. It looked like a brain, with tentacles. Three of them actually, one for every man or whatever they were. Brain things looked kind of pissed but they didn't care about us, they were too busy to run away. I was on the ground again thanks to whatever it was he did.  
"Marie I-I'm so sorry!" Oliver said as he rushed to me. "Are you alright?"  
"Yeah, if we forgot the part that brains danced on my face." I sighed. "What the heck was that?"  
"I don't know." Oliver said. "Are those.. robots?"  
"Wouldn't be first ones I've seen around here." I mumbled.  
"What?" Oliver asked. "Do you know what those things were?"  
"No." I said.  
"And how did you know about that sword being in the river?" Oliver asked doubtfully.  
"You wouldn't believe me." I sighed. "Can we please talk somewhere else?"

"Kids, food is on then minutes!"  
"Yeah, we're coming!" Oliver replied to his aunt's call. I sat on the floor of Oliver's bedroom.  
"Marie, you have a secret, right?" He asked. I didn't tell him. Not about the madness of last night. Oliver was smart in his own way; he didn't try to ask what was going on with the robots or anything at all. He was restless but he was like me at this way, he wanted to think other things than creepy slendermen hunting him.  
"About what I did.. My dad.." He tried explain.  
"It was the reason." I ended his sentence. "Don't worry, I won't tell anyone, like you said I have my secrets too, so I know how to keep them."  
However those robots and whatever those things inside them were bothered me. I didn't give much thought of that robot chasing me yesterday, I mean it probably just chased me because I did something to bother it, but these guys were ready to kill me for standing between them and Oliver. It was clear that Oliver himself wasn't any ordinary boy, that could be the reason for why he was wanted by those creeps, and his father knew about it and if I heard correctly he was happy to give his son to their hands, but I wasn't. Whatever this is, Oliver doesn't deserve it.  
"I hope this won't happen again." He said quietly.  
"Me too." I replied. But something told me this wouldn't be the last time we would see those creeps.

**A/N Part 2:** As for translating for Finnish sayings.  
Johannes is saying "Anna mun kaikki kestää" it translates into "Just give me a break" - literally it would go like this though: "Let me suffer it all."  
And Marie is teaching you some bad words in Finnish - she is saying: "Get your hands off me, god dammit" - you're going to hear much that last word (Finnish one) a lot, since it's her favorite words. I'm not quite sure if that's the right translator for it though.


	5. Chapter 3 No Damsels in Distress for you

**A/N:** So the third chapter, nothing much is going on here, it's just Raph and Marie meeting again, not much is going on between them in this chapter – you'll have to wait till the next chapter. I still have problems of writing a fighting-scenes as you can see. I hope you like this chapter, I'll try to make next one better!  
_

It had been a week since everything crazy had been going on. Nothing out of the ordinary had happened, I continued my life as usual, school, walks with my dogs and ballet, training mostly. Dad was still hunting somewhere in Russia; I hanged out with my friends, came here – ballet studio every day and did what I knew best. I enjoyed dancing, unless we had to dance with pairs, usually I was kind of let alone. Unless he was there.

"So I heard a rumor that we are going to do Swan Lake this year." He said while dancing.  
"Swan lake?" I repeated. "Wow, I've always wanted to see it."  
"Aren't you going to try it out?" He made me feel dizzy, every time I felt his hands on my waist, or when he held my hand – which he had to do because this was training of the dance of love, I always called it and it made me nervous.  
"Try what out?" I asked. I felt much more better – not sweaty way when he let go of my hand and we went our separate ways doing our own steps, but it lasted only a moment, I had to do little jump to return to his arms and stand on my toes and bow down a bit, it was followed by very spinning, and some faster spinning and bowing.  
"Try and get a role from the ballet." He said behind me as we danced together. "I bet you would make a lovely little swan."  
I took his hand and let him be the leader as we did our steps, I smiled at him. "And you would make one awesome prince Siegfried then?"  
"Nah, I thought of trying out Von Rothbart." He said.  
"The bad guy?" I asked. "Well you'll probably get the role."  
Then I did the spinning, pirouette – but I prefer the other term, and stood on my toes again.  
"I hope that was a compliment." He laughed.  
"Oh, it was." I told him as we continued dancing. "You are a great dancer."  
I felt embarrassing, so I was more than a happy to let go of his hand and go to do the steps alone. I bet my cheeks were burning red by now.  
"You too." He said while dancing next to me. "Madame has her eye on you."  
"And what does that mean?" I asked.  
"She expects you to go and have a role." And then he lifted me into his arms. I felt like my heart was going to explode for the speed it was beating. Luckily for me it was the end of our lesson.

"So... Uh, it was nice dancing with you." I mumbled.  
"Same to you." He smiled. When he left I couldn't do anything but to sight for my own stupidity. Seriously couldn't I figure out something better to say? He must think I'm such a fool. I went back to the dressing room only to hear some giggles and whispering.  
"Oh my god, did you see how she looked at him?"  
"She so doesn't know!"  
I ignored them. It was clear they didn't like me and I can assure that the feeling was equal. I got dressed up, just before putting my shoes on, my cellphone started ringing. Oliver was calling me; he had done that much lately.  
"What's up?" I asked while answering the call.  
"No robots trying to kidnap me, just normal stuff, or does my sister's friends count? They are kind of creepy."  
"The land of girly giggles, huh?" I asked.  
"Yeah. I'm not even sure what is the giggling all about." Oliver explained. "I kind of went hide in my room because I didn't know if I was their source of fun or did I just say something stupid."  
"But everything is alright?" I asked.  
"Sure. I just wanted to call you." Oliver said.  
"Didn't we agree to do that?" I asked.  
"Yeah but I don't want to be a bother." Oliver mumbled.  
"You're not, these guys are." I told him. "They keep whispering and giggling without daring to say what is so goddamn funny!"  
"Is that a ballet thing?" He asked.  
"Something like that." I sighed. "Have a nice weekend."  
"You too." Oliver said.

After few months no one didn't complained about me leaving my dogs waiting to the hall, of course Tiffany the queen of all ballerinas did, but I mainly ignored her, since I knew she would run away screaming after she even looked Thorin, Thorin was kind of big and could be scary at times, but she wouldn't bite anyone – unless he was bothered or more likely annoyed by someone he didn't know. Mom – I mean Storm was taking a nap, she rested her head on her front paws, her eyes closed, but she wasn't sleeping. She pricks up her ears and once I was close enough she opened her dark brown eyes. I could almost imagine her smiling.  
"Sorry it took so long, Mom." I sighed as I took her leash in my hand. "Let's go home."

Just as I walked out the building, by cellphone started ringing again.  
"What gives?" I sighed upon answering. "Yes, Oliver I am being careful, and I'll give you a call as soon as aliens attack me."  
"You've been watching way too many movies, girl." Female voices answers. "And who is this Oliver? Do you have some guy you've been too busy fooling around with?"  
I can imagine myself having really embarrassing face right now, because the caller was no Oliver, it was Kiriko who I like to call old hag or just hag sometimes.  
"Oh, Kiriko I didn't see you calling." I replied awkwardly.  
"So I've noticed." Kiriko said and didn't sound too happy. "You haven't returned any of my calls. I hope all that living in the big apple hasn't gone to your head."  
"No, I mean I have been busy." I told him. "You know with the school and stuff."  
"And this new guy of yours?" Kiriko asked with strongly hinting voice.  
"No. Oliver is just a friend. Classmate actually." I told her. "Anyway new ballet classes are little bit challenging. I've done lots of training in there; my fellow dancers aren't exactly kind to me."  
"Well, I know how that can be." Kiriko said. "When I was dancing in that French company, people could be prejudiced at times so I wasn't exactly popular."  
"I don't get, that's international company, right?" I said. "There's Spanish and Russian and who knows how many other countries involved with dancing, and yet Asians are their favorite people to tease at? Why can't people just get along?"  
"Because that what people do best." Kiriko said. "It's stupid but that's how it is."  
We have had this conversation many times before. I sighed, because that is what I always did when she said those exactly same words.  
Mom growled. She stopped walking, she looked back, I did too, just in case.  
"I assume you have been training other things than ballet then?" Kiriko asked.  
"Uh..."

Then I noticed someone standing little way off a head of me. He was kind of tall and muscular Asian guy with really awesome whiskers.  
"Uh, Kiriko let me call you back." I said to the cellphone. "Bye."  
"I saw this one on TV." I said. "Nice whiskers by the way." Lucky me, I've always come across those crime dramas or whatever they are called, where there is this helpless girl and two bad guys ready to rob the poor blonde girl.  
"You have no idea what's your situation is, do you?" Said the one behind my back, he looked younger than the dude with awesome whiskers.  
"Let me guess, I'm the helpless damsel in distress?" I asked sarcastically. They both grinned.  
"Just give us the money and we'll be on our way, sweetheart." Whisker man said.  
"Sorry, no can do." I said to them. Actually they were pitiful excuses for whatever bad asses they tried to be, for one, the younger was maybe couple of years older than me.  
"You really want get hurt, huh?" The younger one said.  
"No, but you do." I said, I detached the leash attached to Storm's collar letting her loose. "What you say mom, ready to sharpen your teeth?"  
She barked for reply, I think that meant: yes. She growled at the bigger guy with awesome whiskers, she took one step closer and revealed her teeth.  
Younger one tried to grab me from behind but I managed to hit him farther from me with my backpack. Meanwhile when the guy struggled with his balance, I opened the backpack and grabbed the first item I could reach. It was my history book, thick and heavy thing I'm forced to drag to school every Friday. Judging by the noises mom probably bit the whiskers guy.  
"You really think that's gonna do anything against this?" Younger guy said as he pulled a pocket knife from his pocket.  
"We just have to see." I said and smirked.

"You're really asking for this, bitch." He said as he took one step closer.  
"Hey, no one didn't tell you to go and rob people." I said indignantly.  
"No, but it's fun!" The robster said as he started to flail with his pocket knife, one came too close to my face, since I wasn't keen on having another scar on me, I decided to try one thing. I jumped over him, he wasn't that tall, and I managed to do it quite well. I kicked his face by doing the jump. Robster howled – or at least that's how it sounded to me, I hit the guy with the book as hard as I possibly could, because I felt like when he was done howling he was going to slash my throat wide open. Luckily hit on the head made him go all dizzy, so I was save for a moment. I needed to get a hell away from here.  
"Well, what kind of party is this?" I heard a boy's voice said somewhere above me. "Two older guys chasing after one girl?"  
"World is full of perverts." Yet another guy's voice said.  
"Tell me about it." I mumbled while trying to get a hell away from here, but I couldn't see Mom anywhere.  
"Let's just kick these guys anyway." First spoken voice said and then someone – a guy with a hockey stick on his hand and freaky looking mask on his face. Then there was another one, green, human-sized something. It was quite dark so I didn't see well. So I just hit what-ever was in front of me.  
"Hey!" Someone shouted annoyed, and I recognized the voice. "I'm saving you here!"  
"Not you again!" I yelled at him. Sure, week has passed without anything but normal and there comes the mad man in a reptile costume.

His friend focused mostly beating the younger guy with his hockey stick.  
"Where did the other one go?" Greenie asked. "What did you do this time?"  
"Nothing, they followed me and decided to rob me." I said as I walked farther from him. I wanted to find my dog and get lost from here.  
"Mom!" I called out, hoping she would answer me. I didn't see a thing. Where was the bigger man? Only a fool would go and yell like this when there's a dangerous man nearby, but I didn't care. I just wanted to find my dog and be on my way.  
"You have your mom with you?" A masked teenager asked.  
"No it's-" I started but my words turned into a scream, someone grabbed me from behind, someone that smelled awful, I felt like I was choking, or more like someone was choking me, and then pressed something cold and sharp on my throat. He dragged me out of the shadow, so everyone in the alley could see that I was the damsel in distress.  
"No one moves or I'll slash her throat wide open." He threatened. I noticed the younger one was gone – he probably got scared and run away.  
"What are you, playing dress-up?" He asked.  
"Not quite." Greenie said. "Just be a man and let the girl go." He stepped closer wielding two daggers or something.  
"Easy there, boy." Big robster said pressed the knife or whatever it was against my skin even harder. "You don't want me to hurt this pretty girl, right?"  
I noticed something else moving in the shadows, something dog a-like, I smiled.  
"I wouldn't do that if I were you." I said.  
"And what are you going to do about it?" He smirked.  
"Oh, I'm not." I said. "But she is!" Then I heard, I think everyone heard growling behind the big robster. Then he yelled in pain and no wonder why, there was maybe not the biggest dog but right now meanest one biting his ass. No one should mess with a she-dog. He loosened his grip, and removed the knife wielding hand from my throat. I bit his arm, it was only thing I could think of, he threw me to the ground and started to flail his knife trying to reach my dog, but she was faster.  
I grabbed my book I had dropped earlier and hit him with it, then I kicked him in the stomach, I hit my knee on his skin as hard as I possibly could, I knew it wouldn't do much damage to man like this, but at least it made him to drop his weapon to the ground, it or the fact that Mom was biting him with all her might.  
"I'm not freaking damsel in distress." I growled at him.

It didn't take long for the big robster to disappear in the same way his partner did. He got scared of the hockey stick wielding teenager and mad man in reptile costume, they chased him away, I didn't go and see what happened, instead I kneeled down and looked at my dog, she looked perfectly normal, sure her fox colored fur was messy and dirty, but she wasn't injured. She looked me; happily, her bright brown eyes glistened as they always did, if I had a nightmare, or if I had a bad day at school or something, I think it was her way of saying: "It's alright."  
I hugged her with relief. "For a moment I thought.."  
"That was just pitiful." I heard someone say. "He run like a coward."  
"Well those weren't purple dragons, that's for sure." I heard Greenie say.  
"Maybe they were just some random thieves." His friend suggested. "New York is full of them."

"We better get back home before something else happens." I said when I attached the leash back to Mom's collar. Then I stuffed the history book bag to my backpack.  
"To think I used history book as a weapon." I sighed. Mom squeaked as he looked up to me with her bright brown eyes.  
"Geez, I know, everything can be used as a weapon." I sighed. "If you knew how to speak human language, you would sound just like Kiriko."  
Then we heard the garbage can falling, Mom started growling and barking for it. There he was, the younger robster all shaken up.  
"Look, it's a chicken." I said. "Mom, are you hungry?"  
Mom barked angrily and stepped in front of me – as she always did when she thought I was in need of protection.  
"N-No, please! I only followed orders!" He screamed.  
"From that bigger guy." I assumed. "He's gone."  
"Those creeps chased him away!" He screamed back.  
"Creeps?" I heard Greenie say behind my back. "Who are you calling creep?" He started walking, pissed off; he looked like he wanted to tear this guy apart. Chicken guy looked at me in hopes of protection.  
"Go home." I told him while rolling my eyes.  
"What?" Greenie asked angrily. "You're just gonna let him go?"  
"He is no danger when his partner is god knows where." I sighed as I watched the robster chicken run away and squeaking after he took one look on Greenie's friend.  
I was going to head home too, but the partner stopped me by asking:  
"Hey, don't I know you from somewhere?" Before I had the change of answering he continued. "You're that girl from the art classes... Uh... Mary?"  
"Marie." I fixed. "I don't remember you though."  
"Your crazy friend threatened me." He said as he took his mask away.  
"Oh, right." I remembered, he was that Jones guy Hannes hated for some reason that I didn't know, nor did I want to, I guess that was some guy thing.  
"Anyway I know how this looks, but this fellow right here..." He tried to explain the appearance of his friend to me, but I decided to make it easy.  
"He is just a mad man in reptile costume." I smiled.  
"Don't you start that again." Greenie mumbled slightly annoyed.  
"Aww, why not?" I teased him.  
Jones looked at Greenie surprised. "You know this girl?"  
"Let's just say we don't have the best first impression of each other." Greenie explained to his friend.  
"You got that right." I sighed as I walked pass them. "Anyway, thanks for kicking that guys ass for me."

I was relieved as I got back home, sure it was quiet and all, I've get used to it. Of course Roy and Thorin made some noise when they came to say hi as I walked inside, they had this thing going on: every time they were greeting me as I got home they had to start fighting, of course Mom would chase them away.  
I decided to take it easy rest of the night; I opened TV, got comfortable position at the cough and watched crime drama while eating some tacos. Not too long lasted until my cellphone started ringing.  
"Kiriko?" I asked for I knew she was the one calling.  
"What was that about?" He demanded to know.  
"Nothing, stupid actually." I sighed. "Someone brought down the garbage can and I thought it was something else."  
"Like what?" She asked.  
"You know, that someone was following me or something." I regretted saying that, because Kiriko had an ability not only to annoy but also to know when someone was lying to her or making stories, especially when that someone was me.  
"And there wasn't anyone?" She asked with a sharp tone in her voice.  
"Nope." I told her. "It's just difficult after living in such a small town."  
"If you could call that a town." Kiriko said. "I know. Life is different in New York; people can be rude and indifferent. You may also watch out what kind of people you hang out with, not everything is how it looks at first."  
"I know." I sighed. Kiriko was doing mother-speech to me again.  
"You just remember to be careful and continue training." She said.  
"I will." I answered.  
"And I assume you know that you should call me if anything weird or disturbing happens." She reminded. "Is there anything you would like to tell? Anything at all?"  
I thought for a minute. There was something weird going on, with the human-sized turtle, mean robots and brain-thingies chasing after my friend. Maybe I should.. No. She just would think I'm crazy and drag me back to who knows where to take a break from things; I don't think I need one right now.  
"No, I don't think so." I said in the end.  
"Call me if anything happens, ok?" She said. "And you do know you can call me any day whatever the time is, right?"  
"I know." I sighed.  
"Good." Kiriko said. "Now, is your father there?"  
"He's on store buying food and stuff." I lied because I knew I would soon have an over concerned and bossy mother-like figure here pissing me and everybody else off.  
"I see." Kiriko said. "Tell him that I would like to have a word with him."  
"I will." I promised. "Good night, Kiriko." 


	6. Chapter 4 - Chased

**A/N:** I hate this chapter, as you can see I suck at writing with the writer's P.O.V. Marie is bit of damsel here, and there's not much going on with her Raphael. The next one will mainly focus on Raph getting to know Marie (I don't know how I'm going to do that but..) as well the future chapters will be focusing on building their friendship, I mean there's gotta be friendship between them. If I had to pick my favorite moment from this rubbish chapter, it would be the last fragment, just because I get to write my favorite character in the story (though she won't be making appearances until a certain point.)

I would like to those readers who wrote me a comment/or review, saying that they liked the story, this might sound stupid but that kind of comments made me want to write this story – even if this chapter sucks :D Thank you very much!

Chapter 4: Chased

Marie Blomgren sighed deeply, causing her dog Roy look up to her with a curious look. It was yet another cold and windy day in New York City. His owner looked tired as she had for few days, Roy didn't understand why, but he wanted to cheer her up a bit, so the German Sheppard went and bit the wooden ice hockey stick his owner was holding on her right hand, Roy tried to take it from Marie, they used to play this game when Roy was little, it was always fun.  
"Hey, stop it!" Marie shouted as she tried to pull the stick away from her dog's teeth. "Seriously, Roy! This isn't mine! If you break it Hannes will end me!"  
In the end she managed to get the stick back from Roy's jaws, and she hoped Hannes wouldn't notice that his ice hockey stick was partly covered by a dog drool. Roy was such a puppy, Marie thought. He was already three years but of course, it didn't stop him from being playful prankster. Marie sighed again as she remembered why she was walking to the ice ring with her classmate's ice hockey stick, it was because he had lost his temper, Nils – the class clown had teased him, and Hannes left his stick behind, he needed it, Oliver said, he had practice today. Marie suggested that Oliver could take it to him, since his uncle was the coach, but he was too afraid of Hannes's gusts of anger – and Marie didn't blame him. She was once neighbors with Hannes, and she had witnessed few of those gusts of anger. For example, once there was this guy who loved to bully Marie and Hannes's younger sister, Liisi. Hannes told the guy to stop if he didn't want to find wake up at the wrong side of his bed the next morning. Hannes didn't kill him, of course not, but the poor guy had to spend two weeks in the hospital. That bad Hannes's temper was when angered.

Nils of course wouldn't want to come near Hannes, and for that Marie was thankful, she didn't like Nils that much, she never did. Nils was the kind of guy who thought of how funny he was, he was one loud mouth, Marie was never fond of noisy people and besides she was too tired to handle Nils's annoyance anyway. Marie had been tired for many days, weeks perhaps. Maybe it was because the school and ballet – she basically lived in the ballet studio, or perhaps it was this city itself, Marie sure wasn't the first person who had just lived New York for couple months and felt like not fitting in.  
"Here it is." Marie said as they reached the ice ring. "Roy, be on your best behavior now, don't act like big brother Thorin."  
Roy looked up to his owner and let out one bark as a reply.  
And they entered the ice ring; just as Marie opened the door she could hear Hanne's voice raging to someone.  
_Maybe we should return later,_ Marie thought. But she tossed that idea; she should just drop the thing in and be on her way. There was Hannes looking dangerously like he wanted to chop the guy from the art classes, but the coach was standing between them, preventing Hannes to do what he knew best when he was angry. Marie was amazed of how the coach, who was tinier than Hannes himself, managed to drag Hannes away, probably back to the changing room. Everyone else were watching what happened between crazy Finnish dude and Jones from the Roosevelt high school, so no one even noticed Marie, until she closed the door behind herself. Everyone turned around and looked at her.  
"What?" Marie asked. Marie wasn't that into attention so she looked at the white German Shepherd and sighed. "Well it looks like we have to wait a moment until we can give this thing back to Hannes."  
"I'm sure glad he didn't have that with him today." The guy Hannes had fought said as he skated to the edge of the ice field. "Tell me something, has that dude always been like that?"  
"Yeah, as far as I can remember." Marie sighed. "It has got lot worse though."  
"What is his deal?" Dark haired boy asked.  
"Well.." Marie said and thought for a moment what should she say, she sure didn't want to tell about Hannes's private life to someone he didn't clearly like. "He's been through lot difficult things lately, I guess."  
"I see." He said as he couldn't think of anything else to say, and for that Marie was happy. "About the other night, you weren't going tell anybody what you saw?"  
"To who I am going to tell?" Marie asked. "If I would, I think people would just start to call me crazy and lock me up into some mental hospital, no one is ever going to believe me if I would tell I saw you know exactly what."  
"Good, I mean Raph was pretty sure you would keep your mouth shut." He said. "But you guys never talked about him existing being a secret, right?"  
"I haven't talked much; mostly I've just run away, since first time we met, he seemed pretty keen on punching my face." Marie sighed. "But anyway, his secret, whatever it is, is safe."  
"Hey, what are you doing here?" Hannes's voice asked behind Marie's back.  
"I brought you this." Marie said and handed the worn out hockey stick to Hannes. "See you."

Marie decided to go to take little walk in the Chinatown, since she had an hour before her ballet classes would start and she had always wanted to visit there.  
"Hey Blomgren, wait up!" Marie heard Hannes calling her, he was that type of guy who never admitted he was familiar with anybody, he never addressed Marie by her name, only as "Blomgren" or "You", which was totally fine by Marie.  
"What do you want, Hannes?" Marie asked. "Did you get kicked out?"  
"Well yeah, coach said that I should go and cool it down." Hannes said as he reached Marie. "Man, you're tinier than you look from over there."  
"Thanks." Marie mumbled but she didn't mean it.  
"So where are you headed?" Hannes asked.  
"I planned to walk around the Chinatown." Marie said.  
"You shouldn't go alone." Hannes warned. "All kinds of baddies walk around there. You are just the type purple dragons would love to rob."  
"Purple what?" Marie asked and sharpened her voice. "And I'm not alone, I have Roy with me."  
"You do realize we are in New York, don't you?" Boy asked. "Just having a dog with you doesn't mean you're safe."  
"Yeah, whatever." Marie mumbled, she hated it when she was treated as a weak girl, but she didn't want to be mean Hannes and tell him to go hell knows where. "How's your mom?"  
"She's better." Now it was Hannes's turn to mumble. "She still misses Liisi."  
"Don't we all." Marie sighed.  
"If only she was here." Hannes said quietly. "If only I had.."  
"Hey don't blame yourself." Marie said. "Look, I don't know what it is like to lose someone but I do know what it's like not to have sister anymore."  
Hannes was more than happy change the subject away from his family tragedy, when he thought about it, he didn't actually know anything about Marie's background, she had just been with the cranky old neighbor when he had returned from god knows where, she didn't talk much, she was always by herself, until she befriended Hannes's sister and had few other friends, but never did Marie mention her life before Mr. Blomgren had adopted her as his daughter.  
"Did you have a sister?" He asked.  
"I didn't say that." Marie told him convoluted way.

"Hey, what's going on?" Marie asked, they had walked towards some restaurant, small one, there seemed to be something going on.  
"Purple dragons." Hannes said. Both Marie and Hannes rushed to see what was going on the restaurant and they weren't the only ones, other people watched the situation from outside as well, Marie could clearly hear that there was something violent going on inside, she could hear the threats someone was throwing at – what sounded to be older man.  
"Why aren't any of you doing anything?" Marie shouted. "Call the cops, god dammit!"  
"It's none of our business." Some middle aged man replied.  
"Then why the fuck you all are standing here?" Hannes shouted angrily. "Are you enjoying this? You sick bastards!"  
Then he rushed inside, Marie went with him, no matter how physically strong Hannes was, he didn't know what was going on inside, it could be some armed robbery like the one in the movie Marie's father liked to watch. But there were no guns included; there were only three young men with weapons, not guns though.  
"Is there a problem here?" Hannes asked loudly.  
"Get lost kid." Someone really skinny said.  
"It's you who needs to get lost." Hannes said in though way he always did when looking for a fight.  
"Hey you're that kid from yesterday?" What seemed to be the leader of the group said. "And you brought your girlfriend."  
"Hey, wait a minute!" Marie yelled annoyed. "I'm not his-" But no one gave a crap about what she had to say.  
"You know what Roy?" Marie sighed, very angered as she looked her dog, who looked up to her hearing her voice. "This freaking sucks!"  
Marie didn't listen much when she was angry, so she missed the part where Hannes led the ugly guys outside.  
"You stay here and check if the old man is alright." He said. Marie started to feel like she was treated like some freaking damsel who couldn't do anything but get herself in trouble. Marie knew she was no damsel, but she also knew that Hannes didn't. But still she did what Hannes had told her to do. She went to help the older man lying on the ground, Marie wondered if he had hurt himself, because he didn't get up.  
"Hey, are you hurt?" Marie asked upon kneeling down seeing if the poor man was even alive.  
"No." He replied. "Are they gone?"  
"Yeah, my stupid ex-neighbor went to get his ass kicked by them, but don't worry, he's strong." Marie said. "Let me help you up."

"Say, why didn't anyone come to help?" Marie asked as he helped the man back on his feet again. "There were many people outside."  
"Were there?" Man asked, seemingly it didn't matter to him. "I guess that's just how it is in this country."  
"So they just stand there without doing a thing when someone needs their help?" Marie asked amazed. Her father had always tell her to help those in need of it.  
"Many people around here are afraid of the purple dragons." He explained. "I can't really blame them."  
"I hate this country." Marie mumbled, but for some reason man heard him.  
"You're from other country then?"  
"I'm from Scandinavia." Marie said, Roy barked out, like he was saying "Me too!"  
"You brought a dog with you?" He asked, which Marie found weird, hadn't he spotted white furred think earlier.  
"Yeah, I would've left him outside, but with those creeps outside, I don't think it's safe." Marie explained. "But Roy knows how to behave." Then she looked strictly at her dog, who responded to her look by sitting down, appearing as calm he possibly could.  
"it's quite alright." He said. "You haven't told me your name."  
"Marie." Marie said. "And I take it you're Murakami-san." She finally remembered the name of the restaurant and from that he assumed the older man being Murakami-san.

It didn't take long for Roy getting nervous, Marie didn't blame him for she had too heard the loud voices coming from outside.  
"Maybe I should take a look." Marie suggested and headed for the door.  
"Be careful." Murakami-san told her.  
"I will." Marie promised as he opened the door. There were no people around, Marie guessed they all just left home or something. There were no purple dragons either as far as Marie could see, but Hannes was there, he was still fighting with someone Marie couldn't see.  
"Hannes, give it a rest already." Marie sighed. She was getting bored or more likely annoyed by this macho attitude of his. Marie was going to say it straight to his face, but when she approached him, Hannes suddenly yelled:  
"Stay away, there's still one of them I haven't kicked yet!"  
"Right now I don't give a damn!" Marie screamed.  
"What the heck?" Hannes asked clearly not paying much attention for Marie but someone behind her instead. Marie turned around only to see a familiar face.  
"It's freaking walking lizard!" Hannes yelled, Marie looked at him annoyed then she looked to the green dude. Seriously, was Hannes blind or something?  
"I'm not lizard I'm turtle, you idiot!" Annoyed mutant turtle yelled at him, his emerald eyes burning in rage.  
"Or just a mad man in reptile costume." Marie suggested. 

Raphael looked at the braid headed girl he didn't know if he was more annoyed by her appearing again out of nowhere and seemingly she was a friend of that another one, Raphael was going to kick his butt but then this replica of Karai showed up. And she called him with that annoying nickname of hers.  
"You got that right." Annoying guy replied.  
"It's freaking human-sized turtlezard." Okay, this guy surely wasn't the sharpest needle in the stack. "What next? Aliens? Robot Assassins?"

"Roy, what is it?" Marie asked as she heard her dog growling – which he didn't do quite often, Roy gazed his reddish brown eyes up, there, up on the building standing next to the restaurant, up there were standing three of what appeared to look human, but the weirdest thing was, Roy couldn't smell anything human-like from them, he smelled something that told his instincts to warn his owner about their presence.  
"That one which is known as Raphael that is known as one of the turtles, when Kraang will destroy the one known as Raphael which is one of the turtles, Kraang will be rewarded by Kraang prime."  
"What the fu.." Hannes cursed. Those men, or whatever they were drew their guns, Marie stepped back, however she couldn't link these men back to that day at school few weeks ago. She noticed the similarities between the men to those that chased her and Oliver, but Oliver wasn't here.  
"You just had to open your trap." Raphael growled as he dodged one laser beam aimed at his direction.  
"Blomgren, you get back inside!" Hannes yelled as he grabbed Marie's hand pulling her out of the way of next laser beam.  
"Listen, punk." Marie said extremely annoyed. "Do you think it would do anything? Because something tells me they will just follow and shoot me wherever I go."  
As he stared at the men trying to end them all, or the green hot head, Marie noticed him grinning to the face – or faces of danger, he didn't wait them to get down, and instead he went to them. Striking the men with his sai, like he had no fear.  
"That's one mad turtlezard." Hannes said. "Blomgren, I don't know what is exactly going on here, but you should just go, it could be really dangerous over here."  
"It already is." Marie whispered, for she had already seen that they too were surrounded by three other men – identical to each other.  
"Who invited these guys?" Hannes asked. Marie started to freak out, for one she didn't – again have any kind of weapon, not even that thick history book she used as a weapon last time, only her ballet outfit and shoes.

Roy barked at them, he stepped in front of Marie, in order to protect her, but that ended up too quickly, his barks were covered by the noise of laser beams shot at their direction, Marie felt someone pulling her away from danger.  
"Roy!" She yelled, for fearing her dog didn't make it, but soon she felt him pressing his fur against her feet, like he was saying: "Here I am."  
"Come on, let's go out of the cross fire." Hannes said. He pulled Marie by hand away from danger – or as far as they could get to which wasn't much, Marie soon found herself stuck behind the garbage cans along with much bigger and took half of the space. But hiding from attackers wouldn't do any good and they both knew it.  
"We're sitting ducks!" Marie said.  
"Do you have better plan in mind, then?" Hannes asked annoyed.  
Marie closed her eyes for second, which she often did when she needed to figure out something and fast. She remembered how she managed to run away from the creepy robot for the first time.  
"I need you to take Roy and distract those guys." Marie said.  
"And?" Hannes asked.  
"It's just a plan; I don't know it will work on these guys." Marie said. "We just have to try."  
"And _if_ it doesn't work out?" Hannes asked.  
Marie looked at the guy, this was all he could think of, didn't he see that?  
"Alright." Hannes growled as he stood up. "Let's try."

"Hey stinker!" Hannes provoked, carefully, Marie looked how it looked, all those men, or whatever they what were no attacking the green thing, two of them turned their heads around.  
"It is human known as a human." Another said with mechanic voice."And it is trying to provoke Kraang."  
"Cool, so you noticed." Hannes grinned. At this point Marie stopped listening, trying to turn circular garbage cans around, though she was bothered by Roy's barking and gun shots. Hannes seemed to be doing fine, for months he hadn't had so good work out, which he could by trying to dodge the laser beams those freaks – as he had start calling them in his head same time as he checked if Marie was doing something, soon enough he figured out her plan and smirked. Roy seemed to be doing just fine, he tried to bit the poor guy he was bothering, however he didn't seem to get the grip of anything he tried to bit, it was too hard on his teeth. Marie looked for a right scene to kick the garbage cans at them. She wanted to be sure they would hit the target and soon she got her chance. She saw another of those creeps had his back turned, that was the best it could go. Marie kicked the garbage can and indeed it hit the target, what was even better was the he was stepping back, Marie guessed he was going to shoot and decided to do it little far from his target and then he stumbled into a garbage can and fell down. However as he or whatever the thing was ready to shoot and his gun kind of fired and shoot the laser high up on the air.  
"Hey, watch it!" Annoyed voice yelled at them from above before he jumped off the building and beheaded still standing man – and it was perfectly clear that this man who lost his head or his comrades were no human, Marie and Hannes both heard this electric kind of sound, Marie could swear she saw this purplish electricity glow coming from the thing before something else making horrible noises popped out of its chest, something pink and tentacle legged, something who was in hurry of getting away – and heading towards Marie – but this time she was ready.  
When it came she kicked it with all she got and yelled: "You're not dancing on my face this time, pal!"

Soon enough Hannes found himself running for his life once again – with that weird turtle lizard thing, for the fight seemingly was not over quite yet for they had just started a fun game of the cat and mouse, expect that they were the hunted, and chased by what appeared to be yet more of those robots in suits.  
"Where did these guys come from?" Hannes though aloud as he was running away as fast as he could.  
"You wouldn't believe me if I'd told you." Turtle lizard thing said, sounding angry but then again who wouldn't when chased by crazy machines. Hannes had no idea how far they had run, but then they came across some bridge – Hannes thought it must be some old bridge they used to cross the river by cars but there appeared to be a sign that said: Off limits, so Hannes thought it must be broken or something, yet he had no choice but to step on it in order to get to the other side. But the chasers followed them, turtle lizard seemed to get tired of running away – though there was freaking seven of the things wanted to kill him, he didn't seem to mind, but before he could actually attack or do anything the huge tidal wave came and flushed everyone away, Hannes managed to grab something rusty so he didn't end up in the river.  
"What the hell was that?" He said. "I don't think there should be any waves that big at this late of autumn."  
"Hey Blomgren, are you still alive?" Hannes asked jokingly, for he assumed Marie to be there too, but he soon noticed she wasn't. Hannes – no matter how he didn't want to admit it felt fear, what if she had fallen down and drowned? The fault would be his and his alone, he was older than her, he should've made sure that the girl was safe. First one to go was his sister and now it was her best friend's turn. This couldn't be happening, it just couldn't..  
Then he heard someone reach the surface. Judging what it sounded it was that turtle lizard thing.  
"You didn't see Blomgren down there, did you?" He yelled at the bridge.  
"I didn't see her." He heard the answer. Raphael however heard something from the shore, some noises, so he decided to go and look – you wouldn't know if there was something you could kick and destroy over there, so he swim to the shore only to see that the missing girl – who again, looked exactly like another girl around here Raphael wasn't too fond of (like his brother Leo was), yet again she seemed to be in trouble, she was attacked by a foot bot, _again!_  
"Well." Raphael smirked. Still he got the fight he wanted. He jumped out of the water and attacked the robot that didn't even see him coming and seemingly didn't notice a thing before it had lost its head. Then she rose up, holding her left arm, Raphael assumed she had cut over there.  
"Thanks." She said then smiled, a smile that didn't fit for someone who looked like the girl from the foot clan.  
"I didn't do it for you." Raphael said coldly.  
"I know." She said and her smile softens a bit, that made her look a little prettier, but only a little.

"Itadakimasu!" Marie says with enthusiastic voice, when she's sitting next to Raphael at Murakami's place.  
"You have been watching too much anime with that Granberg boy." Her friends sitting her left side mumbles.  
In front of her is huge bowl of Japanese Ramen and she seems to be really happy about it.  
"It's great!" She says when she tastes it. "I haven't eaten Japanese ramen in ages!"  
Hannes eats his pizza gyoza but is disturbed by Roy's squeaking noise several times, the dog looks Hannes – probably his hungry too – and all muddy.  
"Roy stop teasing Hannes." Marie scolded her dog.  
"Give it a rest, Blomgren." Hannes said. "He's just hungry, I'll give him just two of these."  
Marie doesn't say a thing, though she intends to, but decides to eat first.  
"I'll better get going." Hannes says and leaves rest of his food to Roy who starts eating happily.  
"Hey, Hannes." Marie says quickly before he leaves the restaurant. "You won't mention this to anyone would you?"  
"Hell no." He replies. "I'm not that eager to go see doctor Granberg." Then he leaves.  
"Who's that?" Raphael asked.  
"Doctor who always takes care of me when I've managed to injure myself or get a cold." Marie said. "He's also a psychiatrist. Not that I've ever been talking to him about my problems."  
"So I take it you aren't going to tell anybody?" Raphael asked.  
"Are you crazy?" Marie asked.  
"That's what you said the first time we met." Raphael reminded.  
"Don't worry, I'm not gonna tell." Marie smiled. Then she ate the rest of her ramen and stood up, she put her dog back to leash.  
"Well I better head for the ballet studio." She said. "Thanks for the food, Murakami-san, it was great." Then she left.

As for that another girl, her day was far from good for multiple reasons, she decided to take a walk – this time like a normal girl, for reason she didn't know, she just felt doing it. She wasn't feeling happy or anything, she just wanted to kick something, so you could image that someone random girl with braids walking with her dirty dog or more like running in hurry and then colliding directly to her, so they both fell down. As you can guess the other girl wasn't too happy about this – yet another reason why she hated this day.  
"Hey, watch where you're going!" She said angrily to our Marie, who didn't even bother to watch the person she had collide with – just because she had accidentally let go the leash that was holding her reckless dog.  
"Sorry." She said quickly and stood up. "You're so not running away!"  
She ran to her dog before he could run away. However the other girl, no matter how pissed off she was right now, she became very bothered of the girl with a dog. She didn't see her that well but now that she looked the running girl, she reminded her of something, or someone. Other girl didn't know what was the reason of her trying to follow that clumsy girl but she did, however Marie was nowhere to be found, she was already gone to the dressing room in the ballet studio, however her dog was found. Roy sat as peacefully as he could at the lobby by the door and its glass that allowed him to see outside. He saw the other girl and the thing that seemed funny about her was that she looked like his owner, so Roy became exited and barked at her. The other girl smiled, for she had always wanted to have a pet of her own.  
"What's with you, Blomgren?" She heard a voice, girly, snobbish voice behind her back. There was few girls slim and apparently thought to be pretty, the girl that had spoken had long auburn hair and smelled like she had just wasted whole bottle of perfume to herself. She looked exactly one of those pretty popular girls at school – when the other girl still went to school that is. She was never one of them and never wanted to be.  
"Jeez, you look horrible." The girl said and went inside. The other girl decided that it was no point of staying here, not even if the girl could be the one she almost looked she was – and even if she was how would've she travelled all the way to America by herself? She wouldn't be able to find her anymore.


End file.
